Indoor Environmental Quality in Low Energy Buildings

Abstract The Directives 2002/91/CE and 2010/31/UE greatly evolved the building and real-estate sector towards low energy building, both in the case of building retrofitting and new buildings. Thanks to the Energy Performance Certificate influence on the real estate market, or thanks to the economic crisis, as it is some new buildings - the best - were built with Energy Class A or Nearly Zero classification. The Energy Building Performance standards, e.g. CEN Umbrella and their transposition, will be improved in the future, in spite of this these should be considered solid, and designers, architects and engineers must apply technical strategies (e.g. high insulation, reduction of air leakage, use of renewable systems) in order to reduce building energy consumption. The new challenge will be to improve relations between Building Energy Performance and Indoor Environmental Quality (IEQ). As regards these relations, the CEN Umbrella provides to implement the Standard 15251. In the present paper we describe the results of IEQ monitoring in a low energy performance building (Class A+ less than 25 kWh/m 2 year). The results show that low energy performance building do not always guarantee a better category of IEQ, especially during the summer

How Much Does the Variety of Scenery and the Different Percentages of Audience Occupancy Affect the Indoor Acoustics at the National Theater of Zagreb?

The florid performance of Opera always in place and the slow recovery from the pandemic by the public to be back to a frequent attendance of the artistical venues suggest the authors to analyze the acoustic behavior of the National Theatre of Zagreb by reflecting five specific scenarios. Starting from the acoustic measurements undertaken inside the National Theatre of Zagreb without any scenery in place, this research study compares the main acoustic parameters simulated with the scenery of Tosca related to three acts. A numerical model has been realized by faithfully reproducing the geometry and the architectural features of this historic performance arts space. Before the simulations, the absorption coefficients applied to the digital entities have been calibrated with the values gathered from the recorded impulse responses. After the calibration process, the acoustic simulations have been also carried out with the presence of audience at two percentages of occupancy

Real Estate market, energy rating and cost. Reflections about an Italian case study

The Directive EPBD introduced Energy Performance Certificate (EPC) an energy policy tool. The aim of EPC is to inform building buyer about energy performance (and energy cost) of buildings. They represent a specific energy policy tool to orientate building sector and retail market toward higher energy efficiency building. The Real Estate market was built in different periods, and in each of these periods the building envelope or the heating plant had different kinds of energy performance. Therefore, in real estate, each building-period has a determinate incidence respect total existing buildings, and they have different energy consumption incidence respect total energy national consumption. The EPBD recast highlight the relation between building elements or technical building system, energy rating and cost-optimal levels of minimum energy performance requirements. In present paper a discussion about Directive's news, Italian EPC and real estate market prospective is presented. Furthermore we proposed a reflection about link between energy cost, energy rating and building property value

Acoustic measurements of the Roman theatre of Pompei by mapping the sound reflections

The city of Pompei has been always subject to archaeological works during the last decades. However, the theatre that has been discovered in the urban environment has one of the best preserved cavea, although it lacks most of the scaenae frons. This paper deals with the acoustic measurements undertaken to study the behavior of this important monument through the main acoustic parameter outlined by ISO 3382-1, and to detect the direction of the early and late reflections characterizing the reverberation. This latest approach enabled the possibility to investigate the sound propagation thought the space with the employment of a multichannel spherical array microphone. The recorded impulse response (IR) has been analyzed in such a way to create an overlay video, given by the overlapping of the 360° image taken at the receiver position with the contour level of the sound decay after the impulse

Digitally acoustic reconstruciton of the Roman theatre of Verona at its orginal shape

The Roman theatre of Verona became a place of live shows during the 1st century BC. After a florid period of its activity, the theatre has been decommissioned by the barbaric invasions other than by earthquakes and fire that occurred during the Middle Age. Many painters and architects tried to sketch and draw the possible shape of the Roman theatre of Verona, by giving personal interpretations, resulting sometimes deviated from the original configuration. During the 20th century the archaeological excavations brought to the discovery of few construction elements that contributed to obtaining a clearer idea of how the theatre should be erected in the missing parts. The acoustics measurements undertaken with the existing conditions have been compared with the acoustic simulations derived from a digital reconstruction of the original volume size

As meninas: sintaxe narrativa e o tratamento espaço-temporal /

Dissertação (mestrado) - Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina, Centro de Comunicação e Expressão

Comparison Failure and Successful Methodologies for Diffusion Measurements Undertaken inside Two Different Testing Rooms

The scattering phenomenon is known to be of great importance for the acoustic quality of a performance arts space. The scattering of sound can be achieved in different ways: it can be obtained by the presence of architectural and/or decorating elements inside a room (e.g., columns, statues), by the geometry and roughness of a surface (e.g., Quadratic Residue Diffuser (QRD)) and by the diffraction effect occurring when a sound wave hits the edges of an obstacle. This article deals with the surface scattering effects and the diffusion phenomenon only related to MDF and plywood panels tested by disposing the wells both horizontally and vertically. The test results undertaken inside a semi-reverberant room and inside a large reverberant room have been compared to highlight the success and the failure of the measuring methodologies. In detail, according to the existing standards and regulations (i.e., ISO 17497—Part 2), diffusion measurements have been undertaken on a few selected types of panel: two QRD panels (made of Medium Density Fiberboard (MDF) and plywood) with and without a smooth painted solid wood placed behind the QRD. The panels have been tested inside two rooms of different characteristics: a semi-anechoic chamber (Room A) and a large reverberant room (Room B). The volume size influenced the results that have been analyzed for both chambers, showing an overlap of reflections on panels tested inside Room A and a clear diffusion response for the panels tested inside Room B. In terms of the diffusion coefficient in all the octave bands between 125 Hz and 8 kHz, results should not be considered valid for panels tested in Room A because they were negatively impacted by extraneous reflections, while they are reliable for panels tested in Room B

Acoustic parameters of the Municipal Theatre of Piacenza shown on different ways of representation

The Italian Opera theatres are always subject to scientific studies that try to investigate as deeply as possible this historical heritage to preserve the architectural and acoustical information for future generations. This paper deals with two ways of data representations based on the outcomes derived from the variety of equipment used during the measurements. In particular, a methodology in line with standards and regulations has been introduced to representing the graphs of the main acoustical parameters; besides, a video of the real-time room impulse response (RIR) has been snapped with a few shots in place of visualizing the sound reflections that occurred inside the entire volume. After a brief description of the historical background of the Municipal theatre of Piacenza, the authors introduce the two methods just discussed to highlight the completeness of data representation regarding any type of room that is intended to be analyzed acoustically

3dof representation of the acoustic measurements inside the Comunale-Pavarotti Theatre of Modena

The investigation of the acoustics inside the Italian Opera theatres has been undertaken by scholars in order to deepening their scientific studies on the architectural and cultural heritage. This paper deals with alternative ways of how to represent acoustic data, in particular by adding a 3dof representation of the impulse response (IR) besides the graphs related to the main acoustic parameters in line with the standard requirements. The 3dof screen shots have been undertaken by an overlay elaboration, showing the particular architectural components of the theatre that contribute to the early and late sound reflections. A brief introduction of the historical background related to the Comunale-Pavarotti theatre of Modena has been given to understand the architectural characteristics of the entire structure