Development and analysis of structural timber-glass façade systems with integrated photovoltaics

Abstract

There is an increase in interest in timber as a material for the design of the load-bearing system of a building. At the same time, large glass façades are often desired in modern buildings. Additionally, the production of green energy is an increasingly important design principle for buildings. These three requirements can be combined in a structural timber-glass façade with integrated photovoltaics, which is the topic of this contribution. However, there is a lack of design rules for these systems. The timber-glass connection design is developed in this work to exploit the in-plane stiffness of the glass panel and increase the horizontal stability of the underlying timber structure. A detailed numerical model is validated with experimental tensile and shear tests on the connections. Additionally, the glass/glass photovoltaic elements are studied with a numerical model that predicts stresses and strains in the glass and the solar cells under various loading conditions. Experimental in-and out-of-plane bending tests are performed on glass/glass photovoltaic (PV) modules to validate the numerical results. With this combined numerical-experimental approach, reliable models are made that can be used for designing structural timber-glass façade elements with integrated photovoltaics.