Abstract
The combined effect of urban heat island and climate change phenomena, such as heat waves, is generating extreme microclimatic conditions in the Alpine territory in the summer period. Since most of the local buildings are naturally ventilated and lack cooling systems, high temperatures are often observed in those of them characterized by high occupancy density and internal gains, e.g., offices. Passive mitigation is common but often insufficient under severe climate solicitation, necessitating active cooling adoption.
Public authorities, however, often lack funding for deep retrofits or new centralized air-conditioning systems. In such context, public building managers are forced to rely on simpler solutions, such as chillers and reversible heat pumps for individual environments. Though these systems involve additional investment and operational costs, they can significantly improve both workers’ wellbeing and performance, often overlooked in economic assessments.
Given these premises, we combined monitoring data and building performance simulations to optimize the prioritization of cooling system installation with limited available resources. We focused on an uninsulated naturally ventilated office building of the Municipality of Bozen-Bolzano, Italy, monitored since 2023. A building model was developed in EnergyPlus and calibrated against the 10-min indoor air-temperature profiles in representative offices. Both subjective monitoring data, like thermal sensation votes (TSV) and thermal preference votes (TPV), and simulation outputs were used to assess task performance across scenarios using the Roelofsen model. The installation of active cooling systems was optimized accounting for economic savings brought by higher productivity due to better indoor environmental conditions.