Analysis on building energy performance of Tibetan traditional dwelling in cold rural area of Gannan: Fid-Bau Portal

Analysis on building energy performance of Tibetan traditional dwelling in cold rural area of Gannan

Sun, Hejiang / Leng, Muji

Highlights • A retrofitted ethnic dwelling in Tibet is picked as a research subject. • The field measurements are launched for the dwelling located on the edge of the Qinghai–Tibet Plateau. • The dwelling has unique architectural and conventional features which are not advantageous for indoor comfort. • Passive renovations are suggested to reduce annual heat load and improve thermal comfort. • The renovations are verified as effective for reducing energy consumption and improving indoor comfort.

Abstract This paper aims to investigate the typical indoor environment in Tibetan residential dwellings, which has particular architectural form and environmental adaptations. The field measurements during the summer month show that the traditional house presents high humidity, low temperature. And the indoor environment is much worse in winter. Tibetan architectural features and ethnic customs are taken into account in the creation of passive renovations that are applied with minimal effect on the overall architecture. Numerical simulations of the indoor thermal environment are conducted on the building models using DeST-h. Different renewal measures are evaluated in terms of how much they decrease annual energy consumption. Orthogonal experiments are designed to optimize an array of energy-saving building renovations to reduce energy consumption and improve indoor thermal comfort of Tibetan residential houses. Results show that there is an obvious reduction of energy consumption by combining appropriate renovations based on orthogonal optimization. The conclusion is that there are economic and environmental benefits of using natural passive methods without considering mechanical ways. The renovations are verified as effective for reducing energy consumption and improving indoor comfort in such Tibetan residential dwelling.