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The need for reduced energy consumption has led to an overall decrease of air infiltration rates in buildings. particularly in dwellings. Unfortunately. this has given rise to a significant number of problems involving condensation. with resulting damage to the structure and contents of affected buildings. Various means of condensation control are available. The use of a passive ventilation system to achieve this aim has several attractions. not the least of which is that the occupants of houses fitted with such a system need little. if any, knowledge of the principles involved.

An energy efficiency monitoring programme was carried out from 1984 to 1986 by the South London Consortium Energy Group, United Kingdom Department of Energy, with assistance from British Gas, Watson House, as part of a demonstration project funded by the United Kingdom Department of Energy, the EEC and SLC Energy Group. 18 occupied low energy houses were thoroughly instrumented in order to monitor energy usage and occupant hehaviour.

Occupants can significantly influence both the heating energy requirements and the indoor air quality of a building by opening and closing doors and windows. If the effects of these actions are to be accurately estimated, both the quantity and character of these exchange flows must be determined. In this paper, data on gravity-driven exchange rates through open doors obtained from field experiments at the Alberta Home Heating Research Facility are compared with laboratory model simulations and theoretical predictions.

The objective of this study is to provide an explanatory model for total energy consumption in electrically heated single-family dwellings, based on publicly available socio-economic records in Sweden. An earlier study based on 3,200 houses, divided into 93 groups of similar design, has shown that energy consumption for one house may be twice that of another house in the same area, built to an identical design. The problem is: how much of this scatter depends on occupancy behaviour? The present study is based on 78 similar houses, electrically heated, built as one group in 1969.

Describes the evaluation of a new simple passive perfluorocarbon tracer technique for determining air infiltration rates into houses and buildings. The authors explain the methods used and present and discuss their results.

The Energy Division is working toward development of ventilation systems capable of providing acceptable levels of indoor air quality in superinsulated houses. The research was designed to analyze and improve the indoor air quality of a superinsulated retrofit house located in St. Paul, Minnesota. The occupants had encountered 'stuffy air' problems after their house was superinsulated and weatherized to reduce heat loss, and uncontrolled air infiltration. High levels of CO2 build up were revealed indoors, despite the presence of a continuously operating air-to-air heat exchanger.

Follows an article by M.Cadierigues in Promoclim E, December 1984, describing radon in the inhabited environment. The phenomena is still not well understood in France, and the possible solution which ventilation may provide is yet to be establi

Since 1973 there has been greater emphasis in Sweden on energy production and energy saving, but the products have often been of dubious design or benefit, and too expensive to be applied to normal residential Scandinavian housing. The economic

Outlines the principles of air flow in buildings: the driving forces of wind and thermal pressure; laminar and turbulent flow; and the effects of the building geometry. Reviews the existing mathematical models of air flow and provides worked examples for a house and a multi-storey building.

A booklet for consumers explaining the effects of house-tightening measures on pollutant levels. It also provides a guide to detecting and controlling pollutants commonly found in homes.