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Sustainability
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Energy Efficiency of the Indoor Environment
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Energy Efficiency of the Indoor Environment

A special issue of Sustainability (ISSN 2071-1050). This special issue belongs to the section "Environmental Sustainability and Applications".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (30 November 2020) | Viewed by 15776

Special Issue Editors

Prof. Dr. Rafael Suárez

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Instituto Universitario de Arquitectura y Ciencias de la Construcción, Escuela Técnica Superior de Arquitectura, Universidad de Sevilla, Spain
Interests: sustainable buildings; building energy efficiency; nearly and net-zero energy buildings; building energy simulation; indoor environment quality; worship acoustics
Prof. Dr. Ángel Luis León Rodríguez

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Instituto Universitario de Arquitectura y Ciencias de la Construcción, Escuela Técnica Superior de Arquitectura, Universidad de Sevilla, Spain
Interests: sustainable buildings; building energy efficiency; nearly and net-zero energy buildings; building energy simulation; indoor environment quality; worship acoustics; room acoustics; building energy retrofitting

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

In a regulatory landscape geared towards decarbonization in the context of climate change, the main methods currently in place to overcome the challenges are to increase building energy efficiency and reduce energy demand and greenhouse gas emissions. However, the energy consumption of buildings is conditioned by the indoor environment, user behavior, and energy-consuming installations in buildings, especially thermal (HVAC or water heating production) and electric. The use of installations with renewable energy sources should also be considered. A balance between comfort conditions and energy efficiency must be reached so that future and retrofitted buildings are in accordance with the impact of climate change.

This Special Issue of Sustainability focuses on, but is not limited to, improving the energy efficiency of the indoor environment to satisfy the needs of building occupants. Therefore, in order to guarantee occupant comfort conditions in future sustainable-energy buildings, this issue will cover a wide range of topics including the adaptable, resilient, passive or active design of buildings; assessment and adaptive control of indoor environmental quality; occupants’ influence; the effects of climate change in the built environment; and energy and renewable energy installations.

Prof. Dr. Rafael Suárez
Prof. Dr. Ángel Luis León Rodríguez
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Sustainability is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • building energy efficiency
  • indoor environment quality
  • occupant comfort
  • building energy performance
  • building climate control
  • HVAC management
  • healthy building
  • adaptability
  • resilient design
  • clean energy sources

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Published Papers (4 papers)

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Research

26 pages, 8941 KiB  
Article
Minimal Monitoring of Improvements in Energy Performance after Envelope Renovation in Subsidized Single Family Housing in Madrid
by Fernando Martín-Consuegra, Fernando de Frutos, Ignacio Oteiza, Carmen Alonso and Borja Frutos
Sustainability 2021, 13(1), 235; https://doi.org/10.3390/su13010235 - 29 Dec 2020
Cited by 5 | Viewed by 2204
Abstract
This study quantified the improvement in energy efficiency following passive renovation of the thermal envelope in highly inefficient residential complexes on the outskirts of the city of Madrid. A case study was conducted of a single-family terrace housing, representative of the smallest size [...] Read more.
This study quantified the improvement in energy efficiency following passive renovation of the thermal envelope in highly inefficient residential complexes on the outskirts of the city of Madrid. A case study was conducted of a single-family terrace housing, representative of the smallest size subsidized dwellings built in Spain for workers in the nineteen fifties and sixties. Two units of similar characteristics, one in its original state and the other renovated, were analyzed in detail against their urban setting with an experimental method proposed hereunder for simplified, minimal monitoring. The dwellings were compared on the grounds of indoor environment quality parameters recorded over a period covering both winter and summer months. That information was supplemented with an analysis of the energy consumption metered. The result was a low-cost, reasonably accurate measure of the improvements gained in the renovated unit. The monitoring output data were entered in a theoretical energy efficiency model for the entire neighborhood to obtain an estimate of the potential for energy savings if the entire urban complex were renovated. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Energy Efficiency of the Indoor Environment)
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16 pages, 1135 KiB  
Article
Energy Cost for Effective Ventilation and Air Quality for Healthy Buildings: Plant Proposals for a Historic Building School Reopening in the Covid-19 Era
by Carla Balocco and Lorenzo Leoncini
Sustainability 2020, 12(20), 8737; https://doi.org/10.3390/su12208737 - 21 Oct 2020
Cited by 22 | Viewed by 4235
Abstract
The COVID-19 pandemic has changed the engineering/technical approach to building and plant design. In Italy, most of the school heritage belongs to historical buildings, which are not only under constraints for the protection and prevention of loss of cultural heritage but are often [...] Read more.
The COVID-19 pandemic has changed the engineering/technical approach to building and plant design. In Italy, most of the school heritage belongs to historical buildings, which are not only under constraints for the protection and prevention of loss of cultural heritage but are often created with a different intended use. This fact implies that any plant engineering project is really complex. Starting from the current sanitary measures for reopening during the Covid-19 era and the crucial current research on this matter, the feasibility of plant retrofit/refurbishment solutions by means of effective ventilation and air quality are investigated. Various plant solutions based on demand-controlled mechanical ventilation, operating 24 h a day, seven days a week, without air recirculation mode, for a historical high school building were studied using transient simulations. A result comparison showed that it is possible to obtain healthy school environments by means of an optimal compromise between energy savings and the best ventilation conditions for indoor air quality (IAQ). Sustainability is understood as effective and efficient solutions for energy consumption reduction and environmental sustainability as a guarantee for people’s safety and wellbeing. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Energy Efficiency of the Indoor Environment)
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40 pages, 2269 KiB  
Article
Comprehensive Sustainability Assessment of Regenerative Actions on the Thermal Envelope of Obsolete Buildings under Climate Change Perspective
by Pilar Mercader-Moyano and Manuel Ramos-Martín
Sustainability 2020, 12(14), 5495; https://doi.org/10.3390/su12145495 - 8 Jul 2020
Cited by 4 | Viewed by 2682
Abstract
Improving the energy efficiency of existing buildings in favor of reducing consumer demand and associated emissions is one of the central strategies for achieving global GHG (greenhouse gas) emissions reduction targets. Contemplating this activity within the paradigm of long-term sustainability implies, on one [...] Read more.
Improving the energy efficiency of existing buildings in favor of reducing consumer demand and associated emissions is one of the central strategies for achieving global GHG (greenhouse gas) emissions reduction targets. Contemplating this activity within the paradigm of long-term sustainability implies, on one hand, that project intervention strategies must be assisted by tools that integrate social, environmental, and economic indicators that must be evaluated from an LCA (life cycle assessment) perspective and, on the other hand, deviations must be considerate of the energy-saving projections that are sought to be achieved through the potential strategies to be implemented. This article develops an LCA methodology whose objective is to evaluate the comprehensive sustainability of existing passive strategies in the local industry through the quantification of environmental and economic indicators throughout different climatic scenarios, which are socially contextualized for a building existing in a Mediterranean region. Part of the results obtained showed a loss of the effectiveness of measurements with an adequate response to the current climatological reality. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Energy Efficiency of the Indoor Environment)
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26 pages, 4547 KiB  
Article
Thermal Comfort Improvement for Atrium Building with Double-Skin Skylight in the Mediterranean Climate
by Refaa Sokkar and Halil Z. Alibaba
Sustainability 2020, 12(6), 2253; https://doi.org/10.3390/su12062253 - 13 Mar 2020
Cited by 14 | Viewed by 6027
Abstract
Atria are added to buildings for their aesthetical, environmental, and economic benefits; the appropriate atrium design can enhance an atrium’s thermal performance and the adjacent spaces’ temperatures. However, inappropriate design decisions cause thermal discomfort and consequently, higher energy consumption. Since the Mediterranean climate [...] Read more.
Atria are added to buildings for their aesthetical, environmental, and economic benefits; the appropriate atrium design can enhance an atrium’s thermal performance and the adjacent spaces’ temperatures. However, inappropriate design decisions cause thermal discomfort and consequently, higher energy consumption. Since the Mediterranean climate has diverse climatic conditions around the year, a central atrium with a top-lit skylight is recommended, but during the summer period it can cause overheating, and the insertion of shading elements shrinks the lighting performance: thus, the atrium skylight design is supposed to improve thermal comfort without affecting the lighting level. This study investigated the improvement of thermal performance in the atrium building by the implementation of a double-skin skylight (DSS) to enhance the atrium thermal performance without shading. The research conducted computer simulations with Environmental Design Solutions (EDSL) Tas software sequentially. The study prepared various design strategies, and different proposals were tested and compared in terms of indoor temperatures, with reference to American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air-Conditioning Engineers (ASHRAE-55). The implementation of DSS achieved an average of 77% comfort in working hours around the year with different opening percentages according to the outdoor conditions. Moreover, results show that changing the DSS glazing materials did not affect the thermal performance of the atrium. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Energy Efficiency of the Indoor Environment)
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