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Thermal vegetation: investigating the effect of vegetation on thermal comfort through experimentation.

Number: pap. 965

Author(s) : MANGONE G., KURVERS S. R., LUSCUERE P.

Summary

Research has demonstrated that vegetation can improve building occupants’perception of overall comfort and air quality. Occupant thermal comfort has been determined to be strongly influenced by psychological factors. The incorporation of plants into office workspaces may have an impact on occupants’ thermal comfort. In order to evaluate this potential effect, vegetation was placed in an open floor office space with approximately 16 employees. The office space was in an office building in De Lier, The Netherlands. The thermal comfort of the occupants was evaluated over the course of one month: two weeks without plants and two weeks with plants. Their thermal comfort was recorded twice a day via a web questionnaire, while the globe temperature, relative humidity, and light levels of the workspaces were monitored at ten minute intervals via dataloggers. Although this experiment was a pilot study of a broader, yearlong experiment, and the sample size was relatively small, the results indicate that plants have a positive effect. Plants were found to improve occupant thermal comfort by 19-25%, at typical indoor temperatures. The positive influence was found to be greater as indoor temperatures become more extreme, with 35.7% increase in thermal comfort in lower indoor temperatures, and 49.2% at higher indoor temperatures, during the fall season. This increase in thermal comfort allows the facility manager to raise the cooling setpoint temperature of the building during the fall season conditions accordingly, thereby reducing the building’s energy use.

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Pages: 11 p.

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Details

  • Original title: Thermal vegetation: investigating the effect of vegetation on thermal comfort through experimentation.
  • Record ID : 30010402
  • Languages: English
  • Source: Clima 2013. 11th REHVA World Congress and 8th International Conference on Indoor Air Quality, Ventilation and Energy Conservation in Buildings.
  • Publication date: 2013/06/16

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