Energy demand has been increasing worldwide and the building sector represents a large percentage of global energy consumption. Therefore, promoting energy efficiency in buildings is essential. Among all building services, Heating, Ventilation and Air Conditioning (HVAC) systems are significantly responsible for building energy use. In HVAC, ventilation is the key issue for providing suitable Indoor Air Quality (IAQ), while it is also responsible for energy consumption in buildings. Thus, improving ventilation systems plays an important role not only in fostering energy efficiency in buildings, but also in providing better indoor climate for the occupants and decreasing the possibility of health issues in consequence. In the last decades, many energy-efficient ventilation methods are developed by researchers to mitigate energy consumption in buildings. This paper reviews scientific research and reports, as well as building regulations and standards, which evaluated, investigated and reported the development of energy-efficient methods for ventilation in buildings. Besides energy-efficient methods such as natural and hybrid ventilation strategies, occupants’ behaviours regarding ventilation, can also affect the energy demand in buildings. Therefore, the influence of occupants’ behaviour on the energy use and the correlation between ventilation and the occupants’ health and productivity were also considered. The review showed that ventilation is interrelated with many factors such as indoor and outdoor conditions, building characteristics, building application as well as users’ behaviour. Thus, it is concluded that many factors must be taken into account for designing energy-efficient and healthy ventilation systems. Moreover, it should be mentioned that utilizing hybrid ventilation in buildings integrated with suitable control strategies, to adjust between mechanical and natural ventilation, leads to considerable energy savings while an appropriate IAQ is maintained.

Towards sustainable, energy-efficient and healthy ventilation strategies in buildings: A review

Rethinking the role of occupant behavior in building energy performance: A review

Passive design optimization of newly-built residential buildings in Shanghai for improving indoor thermal comfort while reducing building energy demand

Influence of indoor environmental quality on human health and productivity - A review

Uncertainty and global sensitivity analysis for the optimal design of distributed energy systems

Energy performance and comfort in residential buildings: Sensitivity for building parameters and occupancy

In-situ real time measurements of thermal comfort and comparison with the adaptive comfort theory in Dutch residential dwellings

In-situ and real time measurements of thermal comfort and its determinants in thirty residential dwellings in the Netherlands

This report presents the results of the second part of the Monicair project1, which aim was to explore in how far the better determination of a number of parameters, which up to now were measured on-ly seldom, could support the development of better prediction models for the heating energy con-sumption in dwellings. Energy labelling calculations, as well as energy consumption forecasts, on which energy policies rely, are based on models. In the past years several studies have demonstrated that these models show large deviations from reality, making the prediction of possible energy sav-ings biased. These poor predictions can be hypothesised to be the result of poor estimation of the U–values of walls, poor estimation of the infiltration and ventilation flow rates and poor estimation of the heated surface area and of the temperature preferences of occupants. Additionally, there is very little knowledge on how occupant’s perception of comfort influences their ventilation and heating behaviour and finally the total energy use for heating. This report presents the results of a field study in which monitoring data was collected in order to further analyse parameters that could influence strongly the heating energy consumption and to fi-nally improve energy prediction models. A mix of modern and older dwellings was studied, as this can give a better idea of possible energy savings when renovating dwellings.

Development of improved models for the accurate pre-diction of energy consumption in dwellings

District heating and cooling networks with decentralised energy substations: Opportunities and barriers for holistic energy system decarbonisation

A. Ioannou

Papers

Energy performance and comfort in residential buildings: Sensitivity for building parameters and occupancy

In-situ real time measurements of thermal comfort and comparison with the adaptive comfort theory in Dutch residential dwellings

In-situ and real time measurements of thermal comfort and its determinants in thirty residential dwellings in the Netherlands

Development of improved models for the accurate pre-diction of energy consumption in dwellings

District heating and cooling networks with decentralised energy substations: Opportunities and barriers for holistic energy system decarbonisation