LEARNING OUTCOMES

The course provides the basics of energy analysis of buildings and associated thermal plants, illustrates the actual European and national regulations and approaches the dynamic simulation of buildings with a software open-source.

AIMS AND LEARNING OUTCOMES

At the end of course the student is expected to be able to:

• understand engineering problems related to the building and its thermal plants;
• estimate the thermal loads of the building;
• approach the sizing process of the thermal plants.

TEACHING METHODS

Lectures

SYLLABUS/CONTENT

Building envelope: losses and gains through opaque and glazed components, requested minimal global heat transfer coefficients, thermal bridges, Glaser analysis; solutions to improve the efficiency of opaque and glazed components of the envelope; infiltration and ventilation loads; internal gains.

Thermal plants: fundamentals of thermal comfort; fundamentals of psychometry and air conditioning; chillers and heat pumps; all-air plants and air handlers sizing; furnaces; plant efficiencies.

Plant-building interactions: calculation of primary energy requirements in buildings; high efficiency plants solutions.

Introduction to the open source software EnergyPlus for the dynamic energy simulation of buildings.

RECOMMENDED READING/BIBLIOGRAPHY

• Kreider, Jan, and Ari Rabl. Heating and Cooling of Buildings: Design for Efficiency. New York, NY: McGraw-Hill, 1994. ISBN: 9780078347764.
• McQuiston, Faye, Jerald Parker, and Jeffrey Spitler. Heating, Ventilating, and Air Conditioning Analysis and Design. 6th ed. New York, NY: Wiley, 2004. ISBN: 9780471470151.