Designing for Thermal performance

 

Contents

	Designing for airtightness As insulation efficiency increases, so does the importance of minimising the extent of heat lost through air leakage through the building fabric. Addressing the issues requires new ways of thinking and co-operating through the construction process.
	Airtightness strategies Location of the airtightness barrier should be an early consideration of design development. But determining where exactly in the construction element the barrier should be is not a straight-forward process.
	Decrement delay & decrement factor Different construction materials allow the passage of heat at different rates. The time it takes the peak temperature on the outside of a material to make its way to a peak temperature on the inside is called 'time lag' or, more commonly, 'decrement delay'.
	Thermal mass Where appropriated, thermal mass can be a useful tool in ironing out temperature fluctuations.