Adaptive Thermal Comfort ─ Foundations and Analysis

There has been widespread dissatisfaction with accepted models for predicting the conditions that people will find thermally comfortable in buildings. These models require knowledge about clothing and activity, but can give little guidance on how to quantify them in any future situation.

This has forced designers to make assumptions about people’s future behaviour based on very little information and, as a result, encouraged static design indoor temperatures. This book describes in detail what has become known as the 'adaptive' approach to thermal comfort. It presents the latest work in the field and suggests ways in which it can be developed into a model. Such a model can be used to set dynamic, interactive standards for thermal comfort which will help overcome the problems inherited from the past.

This book is the second in a three volume set covering all aspects of Adaptive Thermal Comfort, it is the most theoretical of the three and gives clear guidance on creating adaptive models for buildings.

Michael Humphreys is known for his pioneering work on the adaptive approach to comfort. He was Head of Human Factors at the Building Research Establishment, and has been a Research Professor at Oxford Brookes University. His scientific interests are the methodology of field-studies of environmental comfort, the structure and statistical modelling of human adaptive behaviour, and the interactions between the several aspects of the indoor environment.

Fergus Nicol has led a number of important research projects on comfort which have influenced thinking internationally. He has authored numerous journal articles and other publications including guidance on comfort and overheating. Fergus convenes the Network for Comfort and Energy use in Buildings and organises their regular international Windsor Conferences.

Susan Roaf did her PhD on comfort and the windcatchers of Yazd, and after a decade working with Nicol and Humphreys at the Oxford Thermal Comfort Unit she is now Professor of Architectural Engineering at Heriot Watt University in Edinburgh. She is a teacher, researcher, designer and author and editor of 21 books including Ecohouse: A Design Guide and Adapting Buildings and Cities for Climate Change.