While building airtightness is a key concern in Nearly Zero-Energy Buildings in most European climates, there exists already a wide range of commercially-available products specifically designed to minimise leakage in building envelopes.

Over the past few years, there has been an increasing number of airtightness tests performed in Europe either for specific high performance buildings programmes or for a wide range of buildings in regulatory contexts. This has led to the development of competent tester schemes to contain potential legal and competition issues.

Over the past few years, there has been an increasing number of airtightness tests performed in Europe either for specific high performance buildings programmes or for a wide range of buildings in regulatory contexts. This has led to the development of competent tester schemes to contain potential legal and competition issues.

There is a trend to perform more ventilation and air infiltration measurements in buildings, either to strengthen commissioning procedures or to learn from field data. This trend is stronger in nearly zero-energy buildings projects or programmes given the significant share of ventilation and infiltration losses on total building energy use.

Ventilative cooling is the use of natural or mechanical ventilation strategies to cool indoor spaces. It can significantly reduce the cooling energy demand in summer or mid-season conditions. Therefore, ventilative cooling is increasingly common in NZEBs.

This BUILD UP Web Seminar addressed the following:

The ASHRAE 2014 annual conference will be held in Seattle from June 28 to July 2. The conference will take place at the Sheraton Seattle and the Washington State Convention Center. The conference programme addresses topics such as ground source heat pumps, operations and maintenance and indoor environmental quality, as well as the second annual ASHRAE research summit.

Indoor Air 2014 is the flagship conference of the International Society for Indoor Air Quality and Climate, ISIAQ.  The triennial conference first began in 1978 to promote the science of IAQ and climate.  The last Indoor Air 2011 conference was held in Austin, Texas.

ASHRAE and IBPSA-USA are convening this conference to improve the industry’s ability to accurately model building performance. The conference merges the IBPSA-USA SimBuild and ASHRAE Energy Modeling Conferences.