DESC9201 – Introduction to Indoor Environmental Quality

Semester 2, 2018

5. Thermal Comfort: Background & Fundamentals

Thermal Comfort?
- Does it affect productivity?
- Think about occupancy costs – influence of people and their comfort on costs.
- Sexism – female worker’s perceived sensitivity to thermal discomfort
- Individual differences
THERMAL COMFORT
“The condition of mind that expresses satisfaction with the thermal environment”

Neutrality vs. thermal delight?

Thermoregulation
- Humans better equipped to thermoregulate in heat (sweat) than cold (shivering).
- Physiologically, humans involuntarily thermoregulate.
o Blood flow – vasoconstriction and vasodilation
o Sweating
o Shivering
o Goosebumps

- Behaviourally, humans voluntarily

change the environment (fans, etc.)
or personal state (clothing, activity,
etc.).
- Thermal comfort can only be
maintained when metabolic heat
produced EQUALS bodily heat loss.

- DRY and LATENT Heat Loss:

The Six Parameters of Heat Balance Measurement:

Environmental:
1. Air temp.
2. Humidity
3. Air velocity
4. Mean radiant temp. The uniform temperature of an imaginary enclosure that is the net
energy exchange of all radiated heat from differing surfaces.
Personal
1. Activity (met), e.g. 1=sitting 3=walking 4=sawing (??)
2. Clothing (clo), e.g. 1=full covering 3=with coat and beanie
6. Thermal Comfort: Physiological Principles

Sensible Heat Loss from Body

R = RADIATION +
C = CONVECTION

Other Heat Losses:

- Clothing (radiation)
- Respiration (convection)

HEAT GENERATED (M-W) equals

(Sensible Heat Loss + Evaporative Heat Loss) +
(Respiration) +
(Latent Heat Storage)

> Operative Temperature is the average between air and radiant temperatures.

Thermal Resistance Layers

Skin tissue | Air layer | Clothing | Boundary | Ambient

Thermoreceptors and their response (the body is a two-node core and shell system)
Deep core: associated with responses to heat
Peripheral (cutaneous): associated with responses to cold especially on face, neck, hands

Responses to heat Responses to cold

Deep core Peripheral (cutaneous), especially on face, neck,
hands
Vasodilation: increase tissue conductance Vasoconstriction: decrease tissue conductance
Sweat: increase latent heat transfer from skin Shivering: thermogenesis

7. Thermal Comfort: Adaptive Method

Charles Webb noted that building occupants seem to be most comfortable in the mean temperature to
which they are exposed. He suggested that they had adapted to their indoor climate. NOTE:
A Thermal Sensation Vote (TSV) of ZERO = neturality.

ASHRAE CEN
Naturally ventilated Free-running inc. mixed-mode
Regressing votes on observed temps. for buildings Extrapolating sensation from each person
(increments 2deg)

Recent development for ASHRAE:

1. Running mean for prevailing outdoor temperature. Why?

Because most recent temperature exposures have greater influence on adaptive process. It is about 6
months for people to adapt to changes in the outdoor weather.

2. Increased air speeds in the occupied zone.

8. Thermal Comfort: PMV/PPD Model
Fanger. Remember the name.
To maintain thermal comfort, two conditions must be fulfilled:
1) Heat production MUST EQUAL heat loss
2) Heat sensor signals MUST EQUAL cold sensor signals

Mean skin temperature and sweat production are the two factors that influence heat balance at any met.
Rate.

PMV = Predicted Mean Vote

Comfort temperature is the operative temp. to generate a PMV=0.
- You need to estimate met and clo.
- You need to measure the four environmental parameters air temp, air velocity, relative humidity,
mean radiant temp.

PPD = Predicted Percentage Dissatisfied