PLEA 2013 The Human Bio-Meteorological Chart

ABSTRACT: A simplified method is proposed to estimate human outdoor thermal comfort for a given situation using hourly climate data of ambient temperature and humidity. This so called human bio-meteorological chart is overlaid on the psychrometric chart and can be used to study and compare very quickly the effect of outdoor comfort strategies such as sun exposure, shading, sky cooling or wind protection on thermal comfort. To calculate human comfort indices, typically 8 parameters need to be known. In particular the calculation of the long wave mean radiant temperature and the complex effect of the direct and diffuse radiation on the mean radiant temperature (MRT) is time consuming and requires detailed modeling of the radiant field. The simplifications to estimate the MRT and to reduce the numbers of parameters are justified in the second part of this paper. The simplification can be used for any kind of comfort index where the MRT is required as input.
Keywords: outdoor comfort, perceived temperature, mean radiant temperature, climate data analysis