The effect of using air gaps in the walls on reducing the energy consumption of a residential building

Subject Areas : Journal of New Applied and Computational Findings in Mechanical Systems

Seyed Ali Mousavi Navaee ¹ , Ali Falavand Jozaei ² , Ashkan Ghafouri ³ , Mohsen Mahdavi Adeli ⁴

1 - Department of Mechanical Engineering, Ahvaz Branch, Islamic Azad University, Ahvaz, Iran
2 - Department of Mechanical Engineering, Ahvaz Branch, Islamic Azad University, Ahvaz, Iran
3 - Department of Mechanical Engineering, Ahvaz Branch, Islamic Azad University, Ahvaz, Iran
4 - Department of Mechanical Engineering, Sousangerd Branch, Islamic Azad University, Sousangerd, Iran

Received: 2023-11-29 Accepted : 2024-01-02 Published : 2024-01-03

Keywords: cooling load, energy consumption, Heating load, Air gap,

Abstract :

Reducing energy consumption is of great importance today, considering that residential buildings have a significant contribution to energy consumption, so strategies to reduce energy consumption in this sector can have a great impact on reducing energy consumption in countries. In this paper, the energy analysis of a building has been done using the effects of using air gaps in the walls on the amount of energy consumption reduction. In order to check the results, the building design stages were first simulated using AutoCAD maps in DesignBuilder software, and EnergyPlus engine was used for energy calculations. To investigate the effect of using air gap in walls on reducing energy consumption, three different thicknesses of air gap (1cm, 2.5cm and 5cm) were analyzed. The results of energy simulation for these three different walls with the base wall show that the use of air gaps has reduced the total energy consumption and heating and cooling loads in different months of the year in the building, so that the monthly cooling load of the building in the hottest month of the year is 10.3, 12.8 and 14%, and in the coldest month of the year, Also, the annual heating load consumption of the building decreases by 25.7, 30.9, and 33.6 percent, respectively, and the annual cooling load decreases by 8.3, 10, and 10.9 percent, respectively, which is a significant percentage considering the high annual cooling energy consumption of the building.