Analysis of the earth-sheltered buildings' heating and cooling energy demand depending on type of soil

Heating and cooling energy demand in underground buildings: Potential for saving in various climates and functions

“…No single parameter seems to have the 26 highest influence in every situation, although some parameters have a higher influence in most cases. The 27 ground property parameters are not shown for the underground building as their influence on the annual energy 28 demand is very small, which was also observed in a previous study [10]. Furthermore, three parameters 12 (conductivity of glazing, solar transmittance and window to wall ratio) for the aboveground building are not 1 shown, as they only have a strong influence for the domestic building function.…”

“…These studies demonstrated that in some specific cases, underground buildings may respectively 18 save up to 23-35% [2], 47-80% [10], 33%, 50%, 70% [5] and 30% [11] in energy consumption when compared 19 to aboveground buildings.…”

“…The energy performance of underground buildings was studied in the past using various techniques, such 11 as a general purpose program used to solve heat conduction equations by the finite difference method in two 12 dimensions [2], a 3-dimensional finite element program in tandem with a building energy analysis program [10],…”

“…These studies addressed particular building types, such as a sunken 14 residential courtyard [2], a single story domestic building [10], a university building [5], an office building [5], a 15 two-story elementary school [5] and an office-dormitory building [11]; in most of them particular climates were 16 considered, such as BWh (Kuwait) [2], Dfb (Poland, Minnesota (U.S)) [10,5], Cfa (Washington and Tennessee…”

Dynamic thermal dimensioning of underground spaces

“…The concrete walls are considered to have similar thermal characteristics as the soil [41]. The density and heat capacity of the insulation is remarkably lower than those of the soil.…”