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Investigation of ventilation measurement method was carried out in a full-scale test house. The aim ofthis study was to examine the ventilation rate via human expiration. The adopted method is able tomeasure multi-zone airflow rates. Airflow rate between rooms was monitored and the outdoor airflowrate was measured by using the constant concentration tracer gases. The rate of outdoor airflowentering the house and the airflow rate between the rooms were estimated by the ventilationmeasurement method via human expiration based on system identification theory.

Sick building syndrome, which has become a major public concern in recent years, is caused in part byvolatile organic compounds (VOCs) emitted by building materials. In order to ensure the safety of ourenvironment, it is necessary to predict indoor VOCs concentrations over a long period of time.Long-term prediction of VOCs concentration requires the consideration of the influence of temperaturechanges, and there is a need for a simple prediction method that can be used for this purpose. Theprediction methods that have been proposed thus far, however, do not meet this requirement.

This paper report refers to an indoor thermal environment and energy-saving characteristics of asmall-scale nursing home in CHINO City, Nagano Prefecture, JAPAN (referred to as S nursing house)by means of measuring the temperature, humidity and electricity consumption. The city of CHINO, avery cold area in Japan, is allocated to Area II under the new energy-saving standard in Japan. Thishouse is built with the EWIS for reinforced concrete structure. To ensure higher thermal insulationperformance, the EPS boards with thickness of 300 mm are attached onto the wall building fromoutside.

In recent years, as a supplement for conventional large-scale power generation system, distributedenergy resources (DER) system has got more comprehensive attention. This is based on the visionthat future electric power system will not be built solely as centralized systems as they are today. It alsohelps to reduce the amount of transmission losses and grid investments. One possible alternative tothe traditional paradigm is the microgrid (?Grid), a localized network of DER system matched to localenergy demands.

Sweden is a country with a severe winter climate. Nevertheless, cooling during working hours is oftenrequired all year around in offices. Frequently passive chilled beams are used for providing additionalcooling. Often the chilled beams are installed above a false ceiling and thereby the room issubdivided into two compartments. From the chilled beam a plume is generated. Mock up air (returnair) is required to flow into the upper compartment to substitute the airflow generated by the chilledbeam. Therefore purpose provided openings are installed in the false ceiling.

With the increasing concerns on the issues of global warming, urban heat island and depletion of fossilfuels, energy saving effort is getting more and more important, particularly in the city context. Althoughthere are a number of sectoral energy related studies, comprehensive overview of the overall energyuse in cities is still not well understood.

Recently most houses in northern Japan are highly insulated and air-tight, which can lead to seriousproblems such as indoor air pollution. It is important to evaluate the performance of an air-tight housefrom the viewpoint of ventilation. However, in general, houses consist of multiple rooms and each roomhas airflows in different directions which mix with each other. Therefore it is not easy to measure realventilation rates.The purpose of this paper is to evaluate a simplified method for measuring airflow rates in houseswhich have a basement with outer insulation.

The indoor air quality of railroad passenger cabin is often polluted by various pollutants. The pollutantssources of the passenger cabin are the passengers with their belongings, the inflowing outdoor air, andthe interior materials like floorings, seats, paints, and adhesives. In this study, we focused on thepollutants emissions from the interior materials, and carried out the characterization of emitted volatileorganic compound (VOC) in an environmental chamber. We could find out that a large amount ofvarious VOCs emitted from the surface of interior materials.

Conventional techniques for the measurement of adventitious leakage of building envelopes are basedon steady pressurisation at high pressures (e.g. 50 Pa) that are not normally encountered with naturalor mechanical ventilation. It is the leakage at low pressures (e.g. 4 Pa) that is of interest and it is shownthat the conventional technique leads to large uncertainty in the low-pressure leakage. Ideally apressurisation of 4 Pa should be used, but with the conventional technique the uncertainty due to windeffects is unacceptably large.

Photovoltaic-thermal (PV/T) systems integrate photovoltaic and solar thermal technologies into onesingle system with dual production of electricity and heat energy. There are alternative designs to suitdifferent applications. For a given collector surface area, the overall system energy performance ishigher than the conventional "side-by-side" PV and solar thermal systems. This helps to promote PVsince the economic payback period of PV/T is much shorter. In this paper, the various water-basedPV/T systems and products are reviewed.