Thermal Comfort and Energy Use in Buildings

Dear Colleagues,

Buildings are usually designed and constructed to address multiple objectives such as shelter, comfort, productivity, security, socioeconomic status and sociocultural status. With the advent of air-conditioning technology in the early 20^th century, a new dimension was added to building design. However, soon after that and in the latter part of the 20^th century, the global economic recession and heavy dependency of the global economy on fossil fuels led to global warming, and the associated climate change has forced the human race to think otherwise. The problem is compounded manyfold because a human spends almost 90% of their life in different types of built environments.

The building sector is considered one of the highest energy- and resource-intensive sectors, responsible for almost 40% of the world's primary energy use. The building sector also has the highest carbon footprint. With the increasing awareness about climate change and environmental concerns, a lot of effort has been made through scientific and policy initiatives to reduce the energy intensity and carbon footprint of buildings.

Since humans spend 90% of their time in built environments, indoor environment quality plays an important role in human thermal comfort, health and productivity. Therefore, till the middle of the 20^th century, almost the entire focus of building design was maximizing the above three factors. This led to an increase in energy use in buildings. However, global warming and environmental awareness have forced the scientific community to look for ways to reduce energy use in buildings, starting from the design stages.

As we know, the thermal adaptation of buildings and people is important for energy-saving building design. There are now many different approaches available for reducing the energy use and carbon footprints of buildings in construction and in running. These approaches can be broadly classified as technological interventions (such as intelligent and smart systems, smart building materials, smart sensors, etc.), design interventions (such as low-energy architecture, green buildings, zero- and net-zero-energy buildings, etc.) and functioning interventions (automated façade and window-operation control, maximizing the use of buildings under mixed-mode operation, etc.). We also need to consider the behavioral, physiological and psychological adaptations of occupants in building design.

All the above- interventions and approaches lack conclusive and wide-scale data-backed research conclusions, which sheds light on the complex relationship that exists between indoor thermal comfort and energy use in buildings. A conventional wisdom that persists is that the higher the thermal comfort, the higher the energy use. However, in the context of the present global environmental situation, we need to maximize thermal comfort in the built environment, on the one hand, and minimize energy use in buildings, on the other hand. Judging the relevance of the topic in the present context, we invite authors to submit their unpublished and high-impact research to be published in this Special Issue.

The articles accepted in this Special Issue must have core research issues relating to “Thermal Comfort and Energy Use in Buildings”. The articles can be from the following areas:

• The thermal performance of buildings;
• Climate-adaptive building design;
• Adaptive building facades;
• Building energy efficiency;
• Energy use in buildings;
• Adaptive thermal comfort;
• Various occupant behaviors;
• Personal comfort system;
• The application of big data management;
• The application of artificial intelligence;
• Occupant-centric approaches in building performance;
• The impact of climate change on thermal comfort;
• The impact of climate change on building energy performance;
• Total indoor environment quality issues and impacts;
• Case studies on the above topics.

Prof. Dr. Hom Bahadur Rijal
Dr. Manoj Kumar Singh
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

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