Abstract

Building thermal inertia and operation control strategies have impacted on the thermal performance of a radiant floor heating system. This study conducts a two-dimensional numerical analysis of an intermittently operated radiant floor heating system using the Re-Normalization Group model with Discrete Ordinates Radiation model. A detailed numerical simulation setups and various analyses are provided, including grid independency analysis, initial condition, time step sizes and external boundary conditions. Three different weekend day intermittent operation strategies are investigated. The results showed that Case 3 designed with pre-heating of 20 h has better performance compared to Case 1 designed with pre-heating of 8 h and Case 2 designed with pre-heating of 14 h. The average indoor air temperature differences of approximate 2.1, 1.6 and 1.2 K are observed for Case 1, Case 2 and Case 3, respectively, when comparing two-time slot at 8:00am on Friday morning and Monday morning. This significantly highlights the effect of thermal inertia and the potential of energy saving due to the utilization of intermittent operation. Therefore, the current study presents numerical simulation potential in evaluating the radiant floor heating effects on indoor thermal environment, taking into account building thermal inertia and transient external climatic conditions.

Talk to us

Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have

Schedule a call

Disclaimer: All third-party content on this website/platform is and will remain the property of their respective owners and is provided on "as is" basis without any warranties, express or implied. Use of third-party content does not indicate any affiliation, sponsorship with or endorsement by them. Any references to third-party content is to identify the corresponding services and shall be considered fair use under The CopyrightLaw.