| Project: | Psycho Tool |
| Component: | Miscellaneous |
| Category: | feature request |
| Priority: | normal |
| Assigned: | Mark |
| Status: | active |
Hi,
I have recently been reading "Introduction to Architectural Science: The Basis of Sustainable Design" by Steven Szokolay. Within the book good use is made of Psychrometric Charts. With regard to thermal comfort, and the determination of comfort zones, Szokolay examines: -
1) The use of the Standard Effective Temperature (SET). The derived data is plotted on a Phychrometric Chart, allowing one comfort zones for each month. Szokolay notes (as Roaf, Nichol et al) that thermal comfort in "free running" i.e. passive buildings varies on a monthly basis. (pg 12-15 and 19-22)
2) The pros and cons of exploiting solar gains and the impact on comfort (pg55-57)
3) The potential for exploiting thermal mass and night purging and the impact on comfort. (pg57-59)
4) It is used to assess the benefits gained from natural ventilation and the impact on comfort
5) It is used to assess the benefits gained from evaporative cooling and the impact on comfort.
If the Psycho Tool was extended to include this descriptions of transitory comfort levels (i.e. tied into weather data via calculating the SET), as a tool it would be vastly enhanced. Furthermore it could be integrated within Ecotect (if it is already I couldn't find it), thus ensuring that designers not only consider energy efficiently but the appropriate aspects of thermal comfort.
It is worth noting that stills from Szokolay's book seem to be derived from some software (what exactly I don't know.)
Hope these proposals help.
Regards,
Mark Siddall
P.S. I note that Olivier has a copy of this book: it is actually from her reference to the book that I bought a copy....so thanks for that :- )
Psychro Chart
Hi Mark,
Indeed, that book is pretty handy.
Andrew has based quite a few of his work on Szokolay (doesn't he reside in Australia as well?), hence the familiar charts and graphs presented in the book. I feel it is a good companion to both the Ecotect and Weather Tool software.
Most of what you have suggested for the Psychro Tool has been quite a bit implemented within the Weather Tool software, i.e., given a particular weather file, the Weather Tool will calculate some passive design strategies, based on the comfort achieved on the psychrometric chart.
This is all graphically display to present how each strategies (Solar heat, ventilation, thermal mass, night purge, evaporative cooling...) contribute to the comfort of the occupants, based on a variable activity level, solar aperture %, and general envelope efficacy.
You should download the demo to have a go at it.
Any suggestions would be most welcome as Andrew has been working on the next version of Weather Tool, using OpenGl display.
Best,
Olivier
Comments on Weather Tool see Weather Tool
For my comments on Weather Tool see Weather Tool. A good place to put it I figured