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The Proceedings of the 34th AIVC Conference " Energy conservation technologies for mitigation and adaptation in the built environment: the role of ventilation strategies and smart materials", held in Athens, Greece, 25-26 September 2013.

The Presentations of the 34th AIVC Conference " Energy conservation technologies for mitigation and adaptation in the built environment: the role of ventilation strategies and smart materials", held in Athens, Greece, 25-26 September 2013.

The paper focuses on the assessment of indoor comfort and the energy consumption in a University building, during winter and summer time. The examined building belongs to the Cyprus University of Technology, it is located in coastal city of Limassol and it is used for teaching and offices. The main aim of the paper is to make a comparative study of the occupants’ behaviour and its effects on the building’s energy consumption, as well as on the indoor thermal and optical comfort, between winter and summer season.  

An earth-to-air pipe type heat exchanger (EAHE) is a simple and effective ventilation system component, used for preconditioning of the fresh air supplied to a building. This paper presents two sets of results of operational parameters long-term measurements and energy analysis of EAHEs, located under two different retail buildings of floor area over 1000 square meters each.  

The deep hot hyperarid valley between Israel and Jordan presents unique design and construction challenges in terms of energy conservation and thermal comfort. Winters are relatively mild, summers are extremely hot during the day and at night the air temperature remains above 25°C.  Such conditions present real challenges in this sparsely populated yet rapidly developing region. Such development depends on the ability to provide acceptable indoor environments at a low energy investment.

Appropriate strategies to reduce energy consumption, increase Renewable Energy Sources (RES) penetration within local urban ecosystems are the higher priorities towards low carbon cities. In this context urban canyons (UCs) -conceived and investigated as a whole consisting of the buildings blocks and the related open areas- represent the core of the search for new intersections between energy issues and urban dwellers.

The European Union (EU) aims to a 20% reduction of the Europe's annual primary energy consumption by 2020. Furthermore, EU commits to reduce GHG emissions to 80-95% below 1990 levels by 2050. One of the main issues of the EU energy strategy is the radical improvement of the energy performance of new as well as existing buildings.  

Fixed shading systems are saving energy by reducing the cooling loads of the space they shade, but can be a source of energy losses due to the increased need of daylight that they create. Aim of this paper is the comparative assessment of different typologies of buildings' shading systems with integrated photovoltaics. The assessment is focused on their energy efficiency and degree of internal visual comfort conditions that they can ensure. The purpose of the comparison is to optimize the combination of shading systems and their integrated solar cells.

Assessing thermal risk in urban areas is essential, as this can have major implications to human health and may influence quality of life in urban areas as well as the urban microclimate. Such assessment is promoted by estimating Land Surface Temperature (LST), evaluating the intensity of Surface Urban Heat Island (SUHI) and the variation of the discomfort index (DI), the latter reflecting the most common bioclimatic index used for outdoor thermal comfort applications.