The effect of a living wall system designated for greywater treatment on the hygrothermal performance of the facade

Abstract

Besides their multiple known benefits regarding urban microclimate, living walls can be used as decentralized stand-alone systems to treat greywater locally at the buildings. While this offers numerous environmental advantages, it can have a considerable impact on the hygrothermal performance of the facade as such systems involve bringing large quantities of water onto the facade. As it is difficult to represent complex entities such as plants in the typical simulation tools used for heat and moisture transport, this study suggests a new approach to tackle this challenge by coupling two tools: ENVI-Met and Delphin. ENVI-Met was used to simulate the impact of the plants to determine the local environmental parameters at the living wall. Delphin, on the other hand, was used to conduct the hygrothermal simulations using the local parameters calculated by ENVI-Met. Four wall constructions were investigated in this study: an uninsulated brick wall, a precast concrete plate, a sandy limestone wall, and a double-shell wall. The results showed that the living wall improved the U-value, the exterior surface temperature, and the heat flux through the wall. Moreover, the living wall did not increase the risk of moisture in the wall during winter and eliminated the risk of condensation.