Determination of optimum insulation thicknesses, energy savings and environmental impacts with respect to heating and cooling degree-days for different climate regions of Turkey

Abstract

Choosing the most appropriate insulation material on the external walls of a building deserves serious attention. The present work is concerned with the economic and environmental assessment of using different insulation materials on the external walls of buildings located in four different degree-day regions. For this purpose, optimum insulation thicknesses were investigated for fibreglass, expanded polystyrene, glass wool and phenolic foam. Consequently, energy savings over a period of 10-years, payback periods, fuel consumptions and CO2 and SO2 emissions are determined for natural gas, coal and LPG. The annual heating and cooling energy required were estimated by using heating and cooling-degree days methodology. It is deduced that the cities of Antalya and Şanlıurfa positioned in the first and second degree-day regions in Turkey, respectively, were not able to save energy for fibreglass as an insulation material with natural gas as fuel. The result demonstrated that the amount of energy savings fluctuates from 1.91 to 368.58 TL/m2 in the event of employing different fuel types for heating, change between 2.74 and 399 TL/m2 in case heating and cooling requirements are provided together at externally insulated walls of buildings. Payback period ranges from 0.081 to 3.28 years for heating and cooling together. Reductions in emissions fluctuate between 45.65-86.81 % for coal, 31.03-83.21 % for natural gas and 69.64-92.49 % for LPG.