Performance of the wall implanted with heat pipes on indoor thermal environment

Abstract

In order to improve the utilization of solar energy absorbed by the building wall, a passive building technology, that is the wall implanted with heat pipes, had been proposed. In the present study, two rooms with the same environmental conditions were built, and the one with a wall implanted with heat pipes installed was taken as a test room and the other as a control. The dynamic heat transfer characteristics of a wall implanted with heat pipes in transition season and its impact on indoor thermal environment were studied experimentally. The results showed that the application of a wall implanted with heat pipes could increase the indoor temperature by about 0.5 °C and would assert a positive influence on the vertical distribution of temperature. The PMV-PPD values of two rooms were calculated to compare and evaluate the improvement in thermal comfort, and the results indicated that the wall implanted with heat pipes reduced the dissatisfaction rate by more than one seventh in comparison to the indoor thermal environment. Also, it enhanced the PMV value. Therefore, wall implanted with heat pipes as an auxiliary heat source has a good effect on the indoor thermal environment during the transition season.