Conference Agenda

Evaporative cooling has been proved as one of the most efficiency strategies to cool down air temperature. In this paper, the performance of a device that combine the sun protection with fresh ventilation using evaporative cooling is presented. This strategy has been used as heat exchanger in vertical set up, but this configuration precludes the solar protection. The experimental trial was taken in Colima, Mexico, where the climate is classified as hot sub-humid Aw0, according to Köppen. In the experimental stage, two equal devices were compared. One of the remained as control and the other one using water to apply the indirect evaporative cooling as a case. The maximum difference of temperature between the entrance air and the exit was of 8 K° in the experimental cell versus 5.5 K° of the reference cell. Indirect evaporative cooling strategy improves the reduction of heat exchange around the device. This allows to used louvers to block solar radiation and to pre-cold the air before introducing it to the space.

Currently, the approach to social housing development in Chile has proved incapable of ensuring appropriate living standards. Demolishing housing blocks to replace them with new buildings is economically inefficient, environmentally damaging and socially unacceptable. This research focuses on the CORVI 1010-1020 housing block type that was massively built between 1968 and 1978. Today it is possible to find more than 2,000 of these buildings—with no significant design variations—throughout Chile, hence between latitudes 18°S and 53°S of extremely diverse climates.

This paper analyses the impact of different energy retrofitting strategies in the thermal performance of these buildings. Building energy simulation is used to evaluate three scenarios, i.e., the original design, a retrofitting proposal that meets the current code, and an expansion proposal that increases both thermal performance and life quality conditions. Simulations focused on three cities with contrasting climates: hot-arid (Arica, 18°27'S), mediterranean (Santiago, 33°27′S) and tundra (Punta Arenas, 53°08′S). Operational energy demand, accumulated hours of thermal discomfort, and payback time periods are considered for comparative analysis.

Results evidence that proposals´ cost-effectiveness increases in colder climatic conditions; overall, this study demonstrates that retrofitting these buildings can help achieving significant heating and cooling energy savings and improving indoor thermal comfort conditions.

The successful deployment of distributed photovoltaic (PV) systems requires assessment of the potential of possible installations for electricity generation. Exposure to solar radiation in dense urban locations must account for shading by adjacent structures, at high spatial and temporal resolution. 3D modelling of the shadows cast by buildings is carried out with a new R package that can simulate the shadows cast on vertical surfaces (typically walls) or horizontal ones (typically roofs), given a database of obstacles representing buildings in the form of extruded polygons, and the sun’s position at any desired time interval. The methodology is demonstrated for a case-study neighbourhood in Rishon-LeZion, Israel, with diverse building typologies, but is suitable for any location, using the open-source code developed. The simulation shows which building typologies offer the greatest solar potential, calculated per dwelling, building plot area or for the entire neighbourhood. Although roofs are preferable to vertical surfaces, some facades can still make a substantial contribution to the overall solar potential of urban buildings.

This study focuses on developing a BIPV pre-design computational platform combining visual impact assessment, building simulation and energy system optimization. The outdoor exposed surface of a pavilion court building block is evaluated through a physiologically reliable indicator of visibility that determines three scenarios of PV coverage ratio. Solar PV generation and demand for heating and electricity are simulated on hourly basis. Hourly PV energy that does not match electricity needs is used to fit a multi energy hub featuring PV panels, a battery bank and an internal combustion generator. A Pareto optimization is conducted considering levelized cost of energy and grid integration level, without showing a dominant solution: this outcome encourages the development of a Multi Criteria Decision Making (MCDM) tool.