Adam C. O' Donovan

Munster Technological University | MTU · Process Energy and Transport Engineering

The global increase in building cooling demands poses a challenge for designers striving for net zero energy consumption. The prevalent use of mechanical cooling underscores the necessity for designers to consider Ventilative Cooling as a viable alternative in the early stages of building design. This paper presents findings from an exploratory sur...

The aim of the article is to analyze the perceived thermal comfort and indoor air quality of occupants and establish associations between these responses and the building-related, occupant-related characteristics, and environmental parameters of residential buildings (a total of 38 variables). The analysis is focused on the Swedish building stock a...

Buildings account for 40% of EU energy consumption and 36% of the energy related greenhouse gas emissions at present. Consequently, the net zero target set by Energy Performance of Building's Directive by 2050 for building stock is ambitious to achieve. The often default design choice to adopt mechanical cooling in non-domestic buildings highlights...

There is a continued need to improve the energy (and by extension carbon) performance of the existing building stock in Europe and globally. Recent experiences with the COVID-19 pandemic have demanded even more of the built environment disciplines when it comes to air quality and ventilation rates particularly in teaching environments which are see...

Mitigating the risk of overheating and associated thermal discomfort inside school classrooms is a global concern due to its significant impacts on students' academic performance, health and wellbeing. Thus, rising ambient temperatures resulting from climate change can be challenging, especially in low energy schools designed to optimise their heat...

The use of the word "resilience" has increased significantly since 2010, however, there is a lack of understanding around 1) how thermal resilience is defined (where some definitions were offered only recently) and 2) what distinguishes it from typical overheating assessments. In addition to this, there is a lack of uptake in the remote monitoring...

The global COVID pandemic has seen a significant change in ventilation practices, where the need to ventilate buildings has been put centre stage. Longer-term ventilation approaches are likely to incorporate hybrid ventilation strategies to deal with the multi-objective challenge of enhanced comfort resilience in the face of a warming climate but m...

The quality of future working circumstances for many will be contingent on how low energy indoor spaces respond to challenges from accelerated ambient warming. Resilient cooling is increasingly relevant given the need to evaluate whether a building designed today is resilient against extreme disturbances to the thermal environment from events in th...

Natural ventilation can cool down the indoor environment and improve the air quality of buildings without consuming energy. The configuration of an inner corridor with double-sided classrooms is widely used in school buildings because of advantages such as space-saving and compactness. However, the inner doors or windows on the corridor side of the...

Natural ventilation can cool down the indoor environment and improve the air quality of buildings without consuming energy. The configuration of an inner corridor with double-sided classrooms is widely used in school buildings because of advantages such as space-saving and compactness. However, the inner doors or windows on the corridor side of the...

Integrated units that combine Exhaust Air Heat Pumps (EAHPs) with Heat Recovery Ventilation (HRV) and, in some instances, Domestic Hot Water Storage (DHW), are becoming increasingly popular in the domestic market across Europe with over 24,000 EAHPs purchased in the EU in 2017 alone. Early research into using EAHPs demonstrated energy savings being...

This paper presents an energy performance comparison of air to water heat pump manufacturer quoted values, calculated seasonal performance values from standards and actual in-use values for space heating mode only. Within this, the paper determines whether an in-use factor would be suitable to correct performance predictions where differences exist...

There is an expectation in the design of buildings that installed ventilation systems are energy efficient, adequately sized, and, have appropriate controls. Equally, there is an expectation that occupants should be given sufficient information about these systems and how they are controlled. There is also an expectation that during operation mecha...

In this study, a grey box (GB) model for simulating internal air temperatures in a naturally ventilated nearly zero energy building (nZEB) was developed and calibrated, using multiple data configurations for model parameter selection and an automatic calibration algorithm. The GB model was compared to a white box (WB) model for the same application...

The average global cooling demand in non-residential buildings is expected to increase by over 275% between now and 2050. Controlled passive cooling is fundamental to successful operational performance of buildings and in mitigating energy that would otherwise be consumed by mechanical systems. The aim of this study was to determine the resilience...

There has been a recent focus on the gap between actual and predicted energy performance of our buildings, known as “the performance gap”. Inaccurately matching designed energy consumption with the actual energy consumption of a building could result in member states not reaching the strict targets that have been set for the built environment. This...

As the cooling energy demand in buildings is set to increase dramatically in the future, the exploitation of passive solutions like natural ventilation could prove vital in reducing the reliance on mechanical systems. Models that can predict air temperature accurately in naturally ventilated mode are key to understanding the potential of natural ve...

This body of work pertained to the development and application of the Decision Support System for Energy use in Dairy Production (DSSED), an online portal offering decision support to dairy farmers wishing to invest in new farm infrastructure or upgrade their existing farm infrastructure. Increasing the utilization of energy efficient and renewable...

This body of work pertained to the development of the Decision Support System for Energy use in Dairy Production (DSSED), a combined energy modelling and optimization platform offering decision support for dairy farmers wishing to invest in new energy efficient and/or renewable technologies, upgrade their existing farm infrastructure or optimize th...

Examples of well documented case studies that use Ventilative Cooling (VC) to reduce the energy demand for cooling or overheating risk in new and refurbished buildings are valuable to the energy in buildings community. This report and associated brochures contains such examples and provides details on the design, control, operation and performance...

Even in Northern European climates, overheating in many Nearly Zero Energy Buildings is a barrier to year round occupant satisfaction with the indoor thermal environment. Improved energy performance and enhanced thermal comfort should not be perceived as a rigid dichotomy of concepts. However, an acceptable thermal environment, during extended cool...

During cooling seasons, a progressively warmer and increasingly urban world is leading to hostile internal thermal environments in many high-performance buildings. Correctly Implemented, Ventilative Cooling can mitigate unwanted building overheating while minimising cooling loads. Identifying different solutions with proven performance can be inval...

Overheating is an unwanted consequence of modern building designs and internal gains that will be aggravated by the effects of climate change on local climates within urban and suburban areas. To minimise the energy cost of limiting overheating several different approaches exist for passive cooling dissipation techniques. Free cooling by ventilatio...

Robust retrofitting is integral to reducing the energy consumption of the existing building stock. Simulation plays a key role in determining the most effective retrofit solution for a particular building. While many synthetic test cells provide an environment to validate whole building simulation tools, calibration reflects the real operation of b...

In this study, the effectiveness of a retrofitted natural ventilation system in a low energy building was evaluated, both subjectively and objectively, in response to an overheating scenario during shoulder seasons. Four ventilation configurations were evaluated including one control (no ventilation) configuration. Standardised questionnaires were...

Ensuring optimal thermal comfort performance in low energy building retrofits during the shoulder and summer months is challenging. One of the reasons for this is overheating due to internal and solar heat gains. The prompt removal of this trapped heat, using natural ventilation only, is critical to ensuring adequate levels of thermal comfort in bu...

The aim of this paper was to develop a virtual laboratory simulation platform of the National Building Retrofit Test-bed at the Cork Institute of Technology, Ireland. The building in question is a low-energy retrofit which is provided with electricity by renewable systems including photovoltaics and wind. It can be thought of as a living laboratory...

Ventilative cooling coupled with exposed thermal mass is widely accepted as an important strategy for reducing summer overheating in non-domestic buildings. Extended monitoring has shown that naturally ventilated buildings typically use less than 50% of the corresponding energy consumption of air conditioned buildings and assessment of ventilative...