Air Conditioning Systems from a 2nd Law Perspective

In this paper exergy analysis is used to assess the performance of the three most common air conditioning plant schemes: all-air, dual-duct and fan-coil systems. The results are presented in terms of flow diagrams to provide a clear picture of the exergy flow across the systems. The most relevant outcomes are that the air cooling and dehumidification is the process most responsible for the exergy loss and that the exergy efficiency of the overall systems is rather lo

A review of the lighting performance in buildings through energy efficiency

As developing countries including Malaysia, are now moving towards sustainable development is in line with the Ninth Malaysia Plan, 9th MP, the development should be built to meet current and future needs for achieving sustainability of economic development, social and environmental responsibility for the prosperity without compromising the future generations‘ needs. Over the past five years, there has been a move away from constructing new buildings to refurbishing older and historic ones. Thus, the purpose of this paper is to review and evaluate the approach for the refurbishment of lighting as well as the existing energy efficiency policy and measures in Malaysian historical building for the energy efficiency improvement in the future. The paper takes the form of a review of literature. The main sources of this literature research are based on the articles, journals, and internet search. This study perhaps can add to the breadth of knowledge of lighting performance in the historical building from the perspective of energy efficiency. This study offers new and valuable insights to Malaysia in achieving optimum energy efficiency, saving in financial as well as reducing environmental impact.This paper has been presented at 2nd International Conference on Research in Science, Engineering and Technology (ICRSET’2014) March 21-22, 201

Selecting eco-friendly thermal systems for the "Vittoriale Degli Italiani" historic museum building

Thermal systems installed in museums should guarantee the maintenance of the optimal hygrothermal parameters ranges for the conservation of their collection materials. Considering the preservation of historic buildings, according to their historical and landscaping constraints, not all the thermal system typologies could be installed in these buildings' typologies. Therefore, the main aim of this paper is to present some indications for the choice of the best thermal system solutions for a considered historic museum building, called Vittoriale degli Italiani, in the north of Italy, taking into account their installation feasibility and their related environmental impacts. The methodology includes a monitoring of the current hygrothermal parameters as well as the assessment of design heat and cooling loads related to the maintenance of the optimal hygrothermal parameters ranges for the conservation of collection materials. In addition, a Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) of each selected system typology is considered for highlighting the most eco-friendly solution among the suitable ones. The obtained results highlights the feasible thermal system solutions able to maintain the hygrothermal parameters between the optimal ranges with a lower environmental impact in the Vittoriale degli Italiani historic museum building

Behaviour change at work: Empowering energy efficiency in the workplace through user-centred design

Copyright @ 2011 University of California eScholarship RepositoryCO2 emissions from non-domestic buildings - primarily workplaces - make up 18 percent of the UK's carbon footprint. A combination of technology advances and behavioural changes have the potential to make significant impact, but interventions have often been planned in ways which do not take into account the needs, levels of understanding and everyday behavioural contexts of building users - and hence do not achieve the hoped-for success.This paper provides a brief introduction to the Empower project, a current industrial-academic collaboration in the UK which is applying methods from user-centred design practice to understand diverse users' needs, priorities, mental models of energy and decision-making heuristics - as well as the affordances available to them - in a number of office buildings. We are developing and trialling a set of low-cost, simple software interventions tailored to multiple user groups with different degrees of agency over their energy use, which seek to influence more energy efficient behaviour at work in areas such as HVAC, lighting and equipment use. The project comprises an ethnographic research phase, a participatory design programme involving building users in the design of interventions, and iterative trials in a large office building in central London

Robust, Recognizable and Legitimate: Strengthening India's Appliance Efficiency Standards and Labels Through Greater Civil Society Involvement

Residential use accounts for 14 percent of global energy consumption. Appliance standards alone could achieve 17 percent energy reductions in the residential sector. Although appliance efficiency standards and labeling programs (AES&L) aim to influence consumer behavior, consumers and civil society often play a limited role in the design, implementation, and monitoring of these programs. This report considers the contribution that civil society organizations can make at each stage of an appliance efficiency standards and labeling program (AES&L), based on experiences in 10 developed and developing countries

Affordances, constraints and information flows as ‘leverage points’ in design for sustainable behaviour

Copyright @ 2012 Social Science Electronic PublishingTwo of Donella Meadows' 'leverage points' for intervening in systems (1999) seem particularly pertinent to design for sustainable behaviour, in the sense that designers may have the scope to implement them in (re-)designing everyday products and services. The 'rules of the system' -- interpreted here to refer to affordances and constraints -- and the structure of information flows both offer a range of opportunities for design interventions to in fluence behaviour change, and in this paper, some of the implications and possibilities are discussed with reference to parallel concepts from within design, HCI and relevant areas of psychology

Household Electricity Demand, Revisited

Recent efforts to restructure and partially deregulate electricity markets have renewed interest in understanding how consumers respond to price changes. Several interrelated problems complicate demand analyses of these markets, including nonlinear pricing, heterogeneity in households' price sensitivities, and data aggregation. This paper formulates a model of household electricity demand that addresses these difficulties. We estimate the model using data for a representative sample of California households, and summarize how electricity demand elasticities vary in that state. We then use the model to analyze the electricity consumption and expenditure effects of recent tariff structure changes in California.

Multi-Temperature Heat Pumps - A Literature Review

Reducing primary energy consumption by utilizing heat recovery systems has become increasingly important in industry. In many sectors, heating and cooling is required at different temperature levels at the same time. For this purpose, heat pumps are highly attractive energy conversion devices. Heat pumps are widely used for refrigeration, air-conditioning, space heating, hot water production, heat upgrading, or waste heat recovery. The aim of this paper is to review the literature for mechanical driven heat pumps and refrigeration systems with focus on multi-temperature applications. Different design strategies are presented, including cycles with multi-stage compressors, (multiple) ejectors, expansion valves, cascades (with secondary loops), and separated gas coolers. This review highlights the major advantages, challenges, and industrial applications of each multi-temperature heat pump cycle family. Schematics and pressure-enthalpy diagrams illustrate the most promising cycles. The performance of the cycles is compared in terms of First Law efficiency (COP) and Second Law efficiency (exergy) using simplified thermodynamic simulations. The literature reveals that the major part (approximately 70%) of multi-temperature heat pump applications are found in refrigeration, i.e. supermarket food cooling, household fridges/freezers, and cooling/air-conditioning/storage during transportation. In contrast, studies on multi-temperature heating applications are rather rare with the exception of space floor heating and hot water production. Most multi-temperature cycle designs use two heat sources or two heat sinks. Heat pumps with more than three stages are not common, except for natural gas liquefaction. In supermarket applications, multiple compressors with transcritical CO2 are an established key technology. Cascades with secondary loops are another frequently applied system, mostly in the USA. Cycles with multiple ejectors are ready to market and seem to be a promising modification for system performance improvement. Ejector cycles in refrigeration and air-conditioning systems are still under development. Expansion valve cycles are an established technology in household refrigeration. Separated gas coolers for space and hot water heating have recently attracted attention due to the possible combination with supercritical CO2 cycles. Overall, this review paper serves to select the most appropriate multi-temperature heat pump cycle for a specific application

A Proposal of Lean Design Integration Method for Hierarchical Architecture Type Product Systems (A Practical Lean Development Example in Domestic Refrigerator Energy Saving Design with a Combination of CAE, Real experiment and Humanistic collaboration)

In developing process for competitive commercial refrigerator/ air-conditioning system products, practical whole system integration method is very important to realize a compact product with high cost performance. These products are characterized by hierarchical architecture type module product systems. This paper proposes a practical lean development method which combines 1D and 3D-CAE analysis with human decision making process. A Model-based development method using product base platform is also proposed for realizing a practical product family series development. Finally, the effectiveness of this method is demonstrated quantitatively by applying to an energy saving type household refrigerator