Analysis of accurate spatial use patterns within rooms for optimizing heating systems

Abstract

Dwellings in Belgium are comparatively larger than in other European countries and their size is often not in line with the actual occupancy rate. In view of the impact of occupant presence and behavior on the actual energy consumption, knowledge of the effective spatial use is useful to develop more efficient and effective heating systems. This paper discusses the spatial use of three single family houses. The exact use patterns of the residents within the rooms were monitored for 9 consecutive days in autumn and winter 2017-2018. These data are combined with the residents’ thermal comfort evaluation and their actions on windows and heating systems. It revealed that most rooms are completely heated whereas residents only use particular spots, use them for passing through or do not use them at all. These insights could be used to develop new heating systems, more adapted to the actual spatial use.