Hygrothermal performance of a building across different climates of India

Abstract

Literature review suggests that building energy consumption is dependent on climatic conditions and hygrothermal characteristics of building materials. This paper summarises the impact of hygrothermal characteristics of building materials on energy consumption in context of five climate zones of India. Numerical simulations of a test building were conducted with and without consideration of moisture transfer through/at walls. EnergyPlus (2016) software was employed for hygrothermal analysis. Moisture absorption at the inner wall surfaces reduces indoor relative humidity. This reduces the heating energy requirement by around 20% for temperate, composite and cold climates. The cooling energy requirement increases in all climate zones but the relative increase is less than 2%.