Sustainable Building Services
Overheat Analysis
Overheat Analysis is part of our Detailed Design service and includes powerful visualisation and calculations (Dynamic Simulation with IES-VE).
Overheating is more and more of a risk in new builds, even in Scotland. We can assess the design choices for shading, glazing, blinds and ventilation to allow compliance with guidance such as CIBSE TM52.
This saves money on unnecessary mitigation measures and may avoid the use of air conditioning systems say.
Building Services
Overheating Analysis
Overheating
Overheating is a becoming more of a problem in building design. As we use ever more insulated buildings with tightly controlled ventilation there is an increased risk of discomfort particularly in the summer months or night time in bedrooms.
The industry has developed guidance such as CIBSE TM52 (“The Limits of Thermal Comfort: Avoiding Overheating in European Buildings 2013”), CIBSE KS16 (“How to manage overheating in Buildings”) and CIBSE TM49 (Future weather data) and Building Bulletin 01 (“Guidelines on ventilation, thermal comfort and indoor air quality in schools”).
Overheat Study
Overheating is a measure of:
- Number of hours in a particular room that is occupied that exceeds a likely “comfort temperature”
- Severity of overheating- i.e. a measure of the temperature rise and duration
- An absolute maximum temperature within a given daily period
In simple terms, a good test is to think “how comfortable would it be to sleep in that bedroom on a hot summer day …”!
Overheating Study
Overheating is a measure of how you may feel (“operative comfort”) in your building. Thermal comfort is complex and dynamic (constantly changing), thus it makes sense to use a dynamic simulation model to predict the all the factors. The basic physical factors are air temperature; radiant temperature; humidity and air movement. We also model users (assumptions on clothing and activity) and their behaviour (for example they may open a window or draw down a shade or blind).
Although it is difficult to give a precise risk at a particular time as the phenomenon is inherently imprecise, by looking at the factors in detail we can give an good statistical indication of risk of a particular room overheating.
This allows choices about reflective glass, blinds and which windows to be fixed or openable a more scientific basis in the design process. It’s all part of having a healthy home.
See also this case study.
"the thermal modelling should ideally be able to predict the variations in temperature distributions and airflows within rooms, and also simulate the ventilation and other adaptive behaviour of the occupants"
CIBSE TM52 “The Limits of thermal comfort: avoiding overheating in European buildings”
Independent Service Engineers
How We
Can Help
Traditionally heating/services were a standard work package handled by the trades and architects but buildings, regulations and the needs of the client have become more complex over time, and rightly so. Heating is integral to the comfort and well-being of your home/work and is only now been given proper consideration in the build. Also, often it can have the largest impact on operating cost for you in terms of bills and carbon impact over the long-term. In addition, there are a multitude of options available with renewable technologies in a fast-changing market. There can be a considerable cost benefit to have input from specialist independent building service engineers at several stages.
01
Sustainable Design
Over 18 years only doing low carbon and sustainable technology
02
Data Driven Design
Accuracy drives good decisions and saves money in plant capital and operational costs.
03
Practical Design
Longstanding experience of how systems interact and are delivered in the ‘real’ world.
Use our decades of experience
Appointing an engineer to deal with the all services will save you time, money and energy!
Energy is complex!
our professional services Include:
Lùths Services are an independent services engineering consultancy who specialise in low energy and renewable design and implementation.
Issues that may arise in Services
- Oversizing Services
- Non flexibility of approach to large / small projects
- Non suitability of technology in reality
- Lack of integration between services