Ventilation heat loss in a detached one family house.

For optimum building design it is of importance to investigate the comfort and the energy conservation obtained with different types of ventilation systems and levels of airtightness of buildings. This could be achieved by aid of computer models based on full-scale and model measurements. In order to obtain experimental data as input data to such a computer model, an experimental, detached one-family house has been built near to Gothenburg on the Swedish west coast. The house is inhabited and has built-i n facilities to change the air tightness level and distribution by specially designed leaking panels. It is also possible to alter the flow rates, using one of three possibilities regarding ventilation; natural ventilation, mechanical exhaust ventilation and mechanical supply and exhaust ventilation with heat recovery. The house, moreover, is equipped with a pressure scanner and plastic tubes connected to some 250 pressure taps, distributed around the perimeter and in wall and roof cavities. Data from the pressure scanner are fed into a computer system together with continuous data concerning wind speed, wind direction, temperature and tracer gas concentration. This paper outlines the research program and describes the instrumentation and some features of the house.