Social, financial, energy and technical data from about 1110 households have been collected during2004 in the major Athens area. The sample has been divided in seven income groups and a detailedanalysis has been performed. Important conclusions have been drawn regarding the quality ofhouseholds, the operational conditions and the energy spent per income group. Low income people aremore likely to be living in old buildings with poor envelope conditions. The cost per person and unit areais much higher for the low income group for both heating and electricity.
The effectiveness of natural ventilation, i.e. its ability to ensure indoor air quality and passive cooling ina building, depends greatly on the design process.
The traditional house of Japan, Kominka, is constructed of wooden pillars and beams, and clay walls.The indoor space in the Kominka remains cool in summer because overhanging eaves block solarradiation and the open frame airs out. Technology to make small cracks airtight is undeveloped.Consequently, drafts enter the indoor space and chill occupants during winter. Improvements of indoorclimate have not been realized. This report describes "Yukis house," which is a Kominka built in thelatter 1700s, defined as a residence of the privileged class.
Farming is very popular in Tohoku Region. Especially the yield of rice in this region is more than 10%of that in Japan. However, farmers have a problem with its storage in winter and summer. In general,rice should be harvested in autumn, and be stored until the harvest next year. To store it in summer,electric refrigerators are generally used and they cost a couple of million yen every year.
There is an obvious and indisputable need for an increase in the efficiency of energy utilisation inbuildings. Heating, cooling and lighting appliances in buildings account for more than one third of theworlds primary energy demand. In turn, building stock is a major contributor to energy-relatedenvironmental problems.
Mould can cause allergic, toxic or infectious reactions (Bardana 2003). The lack of quality standardsfor assessment and removal of indoors mould has caused the German Federal Environmental Office(germ: Umweltbundesamt, UBA) to issue several health-related guidelines (UBA 2002). This studyrecorded to what extend these recommendations has been realized by experts for assessment andremoval of indoors mould damage in Greater Bielefeld, Germany. The expert companies conductedeither assessment (inspectors) or removal (craftsmen) or both, assessment and removal, of mould(case managers).
Decomposition of toluene in air was studied by dielectric barrier discharge (DBD) on the one hand aswell as UV light as assistance to DBD on the other hand.Input energy to reaction chamber, flow rate of contaminated air, and concentration of toluene werestudied as parameters influencing on the decomposition rate of toluene by two methods.Increasing the input energy from 2.8 kV to 4.2 kV at flow rate 1 SLM was increased the decompositionrate of toluene from 3.5% to 10%.
Use of a portable HEPA filter cleaner in a room is believed to be capable of reducing the risk oftransmission of infectious diseases through removing the particles or large droplets to which pathogensare attached. It is hoped that the portable HEPA filter(s) can increase the effective air change rate (forparticle removal only) in a general ward to the ventilation standard of an isolation ward for emerginginfection diseases when there are insufficient number of isolation wards.
The growing worldwide demand for less polluting forms of energy has led to a renewed interest in theuse of micro combined heat and power (CHP) technologies in the residential sector. Micro CHP is thesimultaneous production of heat and power in a single building based on small energy conversion units.The heat produced is used for space and water heating and possibly for cooling, the electricity is usedwithin the building.In this paper, two typical CHP types for a residential building are analyzed, namely ECOWILL gasengine plant and LIFUEL fuel cell plant.
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