Energies, Vol. 12, Pages 1038: Study on the Thermal Performance of a Hybrid Heat Collecting Facade Used for Passive Solar Buildings in Cold Region (Energies)

Passive solar technologies are traditionally considered as cost-effective ways for the building heating. However, conventional passive solar buildings are insufficient to create a relatively stable and comfortable indoor thermal environment. To further increase the indoor air temperature and reduce the heating energy consumption, a hybrid heat collecting facade (HHCF) is proposed in this paper. To analyze the thermal performance of the HHCF, a heat transfer model based on the heat balance method is established and validated by experimental results. Meanwhile, the energy saving potential of a room with the HHCF is evaluated as well. When the HHCF is applied to places where heating is required in the cold season while refrigeration is unnecessary in hot season, the HHCF can reduce the heating need by 40.2% and 21.5% compared with the conventional direct solar heat gain window and the Trombe wall, respectively. Furthermore, a series of parametric analyses are performed to investigate the thermal performance of the room with HHCF under various design and operating conditions. It is found that the thermal performance of the HHCF mainly depends on the window operational schedule, the width and the absorptivity of heat collecting wall, and the thermal performance of the inner double-glass window. The modeling and the parametric study in this paper are beneficial to the design and the optimization of the HHCF in passive solar buildings.