proceedingsof8thwindsorconferencecountingthecost.docVIP

Proceedings of 8th Windsor Conference: Counting the Cost of Comfort in a changing world Cumberland Lodge, Windsor, UK, 10-13 April 2014. London: Network for Comfort and Energy Use in Buildings, .uk Occupant time period of thermal adaption to change of outdoor air temperature in naturally ventilated buildings Weiwei Liu1,2, Pawel Wargocki2, Jing Xiong3 1 School of Energy Science Engineering, Central South University, Changsha, Hunan, China, wliu@ 2 International Centre for Indoor Environment and Energy, Technical University of Denmark, Kongens Lyngby, Denmark, paw@byg.dtu.dk 3 School of Naval Architecture, Ocean Civil Engineering, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai, China, xiongjing@ Abstract The present work proposed a method to determine time period of thermal adaption of occupants in naturally ventilated building, based on the relationship between their neutral temperatures and running mean outdoor air temperature. Based on the data of the field investigation, the subjects’ time period of thermal adaption was obtained with the proposed method. The result revealed that the subjects needed to take 4.25 days to fully adapt to a step-change in outdoor air temperature. The time period of thermal adaption for the occupants in five European countries was also calculated and compared with the value of the subjects in this study. The comparison shows that the occupants in China had a shorter time period of thermal adaption than European occupants, which means that Chinese occupants can adapt to a new outdoor climate condition faster. Keywords: Thermal adaption; Time period; Neutral temperature; Running mean temperature 1. Introduction Indoor thermal environment in a naturally ventilated building always changes with outdoor climate, leading to variable thermal comfort requirement of occupants (ASHRAE, 2004; EN15251, 2007). Thermal adaption has been widely accepted as the theoretical principle of thermal comfort in naturally ventilated buildings (Br