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Heat-flow variability of suspended timber ground floors: Implications for in-situ heat-flux measuring

Pelsmakers, S; Fitton, R; Biddulph, P; Swan, W; Croxford, B; Stamp, S; Calboli, FCF; ... Elwell, CA; + view all (2017) Heat-flow variability of suspended timber ground floors: Implications for in-situ heat-flux measuring. Energy and Buildings , 138 pp. 396-405. 10.1016/j.enbuild.2016.12.051. Green open access

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Abstract

Reducing space heating energy demand supports the UK’s legislated carbon emission reduction targets and requires the effective characterisation of the UK’s existing housing stock to facilitate retrofitting decision-making. Approximately 6.6 million UK dwellings pre-date 1919 and are predominantly of suspended timber ground floor construction, the thermal performance of which has not been extensively investigated. This paper examines suspended timber ground floor heat-flow by presenting high resolution in-situ heat-flux measurements undertaken in a case study house at 15 point locations on the floor. The results highlight significant variability in observed heat-flow: point U-values range from 0.56 ± 0.05 to 1.18 ± 0.11 Wm−2 K−1. This highlights that observing only a few measurements is unlikely to be representative of the whole floor heat-flow and the extrapolation from such point values to whole floor U-value estimates could lead to its over- or under- estimation. Floor U-value models appear to underestimate the actual measured floor U-value in this case study. This paper highlights the care with which in-situ heat-flux measuring must be undertaken to enable comparison with models, literature and between studies and the findings support the unique, high-resolution in-situ monitoring methodology used in this study for further research in this area.

Type: Article
Title: Heat-flow variability of suspended timber ground floors: Implications for in-situ heat-flux measuring
Open access status: An open access version is available from UCL Discovery
DOI: 10.1016/j.enbuild.2016.12.051
Publisher version: http://doi.org/10.1016/j.enbuild.2016.12.051
Language: English
Additional information: Copyright © 2017. This manuscript version is published under a Creative Commons Attribution Non-commercial Non-derivative 4.0 International licence (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0). This licence allows you to share, copy, distribute and transmit the work for personal and non-commercial use providing author and publisher attribution is clearly stated. Further details about CC BY licences are available at http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0. Access may be initially restricted by the publisher.
Keywords: building performance, In-situ U-values, Pre-1919 housing, Retrofit, Suspended timber ground floors, Thermal performance
UCL classification: UCL
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS > Faculty of the Built Environment
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS > Faculty of the Built Environment > Bartlett School Env, Energy and Resources
URI: https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/1537137
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