Analysis of an Attached Sunspace with a Thermal Inertia Floor

María José Suárez López, Antonio José Gutiérrez Trashorras, Jorge Luis Parrondo Gayo and Eduardo Blanco Marigorta
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María José Suárez López: Campus de Viesques, Universidad de Oviedo, EDZE (Energía), 33203 Gijón (Asturias), Spain
Antonio José Gutiérrez Trashorras: Campus de Viesques, Universidad de Oviedo, EDZE (Energía), 33203 Gijón (Asturias), Spain
Jorge Luis Parrondo Gayo: Campus de Viesques, Universidad de Oviedo, EDZE (Energía), 33203 Gijón (Asturias), Spain
Eduardo Blanco Marigorta: Campus de Viesques, Universidad de Oviedo, EDZE (Energía), 33203 Gijón (Asturias), Spain

Energies, 2018, vol. 11, issue 5, 1-14

Abstract: An attached sunspace is a partially or fully glazed enclosure, usually located on the first floor, facing south (in the Northern Hemisphere) and adjacent to a conditioned room. Because of the length and orientation of the glazed area, the temperature in the sunspace is usually higher than outside the building. As a Trombe–Mitchel wall, the sunspace has a considerable mass that accumulates thermal energy, but in this case the thermal mass is located in the floor. This capacity to accumulate thermal energy confers the attached sunspace features beyond passive insulation. The sunspace studied in this paper is part of an experimental building located in the North of Spain that was built in the frame of the so-called ARFRISOL project. It consists of a south-facing glazed exterior wall with both clear glass and semi-transparent photovoltaic panels, an intermediate space with a thick layer of sand over a concrete floor, and a partially glazed interior wall. In this paper, a three-dimensional computational model has been implemented to analyse the thermal behaviour inside the sunspace. This analysis takes into account, among other factors, the effects of sun position, incident solar irradiation and temperature both inside and outside.

Keywords: sunspace; CFD (computational fluid dynamics); energy-efficient buildings; solar passive design (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q Q0 Q4 Q40 Q41 Q42 Q43 Q47 Q48 Q49 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2018
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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