SOLAR ENERGY

Utilization

ENGS-44 Sustainable Design

Benoit Cushman-Roisin
16 April 2019

Recapitulation

1. We know how much energy the sun provides

as a function of

- latitude of location
- orientation of surface (window, roof)
Solar Heat Gain Factors
- month of year
(SHGFs)
- hour of day

- cloudiness Sunshine factor (%)

2. We know the energy need of the building

as a function of

- R-values of walls, windows, roof, etc.

- respective surfaces of walls, roof, etc. Heat Loss (HL)
- air infiltration

- how cold it is outside Degree-Days (DD)

The question now is:

How much of the need (part 2) can we meet with the sun (part 1)?

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 In building design,
there are basically three passive solar techniques:

1. Direct gain (= let the sun enter through windows)

2. Trombe wall (= enhanced direct gain)

3. Greenhouse (= enhanced trombe wall)

Caution!
These techniques, if used at all, need to be used extremely
carefully, for it is very easy to focus on cold winter days and
then have a building that is uncomfortably warm in summer.

Calculations Recipe for Direct Gain

1. Determine square-feet of glazing (windows)

on East (Ae), South (As), West (Aw) and North (AN) sides of the building.

2. Adjust these areas downward for shading by overhangs, vegetation

or neighboring structures

3. Select a month and pick the values SHGFe, SHGFs, SHGFw, and SHGFN.

4. Discount the SHGF’s for cloudiness by applying the sunshine %.

5. Correct for partial reflection by window glass (87% or applicable

solar heat gain coefficient (SHGC) depending on window type).

6. Multiply and add for each side of the building:

Solar heat gain per day of the month =
SHG = SGHFe x Ae + SHGFs x As + SHGFw x Aw + SHGFN x AN

6. Multiply by number of days in the month.

7. Repeat for other months of the heating season and add the numbers.

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 Example: Salt-box house in Lebanon, NH

Near 40oN → SHGFs, in BTUs/(ft2.day), and cloudiness factors, in %

Heating month East South West North Sunshine

September 906 1344 906 238 57%
October 712 1582 712 176 55% Need to multiply by 0.87
November 508 1596 508 126 46% to account for reflection
December 427 1550 427 104 46%
at window surface
January 514 1626 514 122 46%
February 733 1642 733 168 55%
March 946 1388 946 228 56%
April 1105 976 1105 308 54%
May 1200 716 1200 430 57% Degree-days
for Lebanon, NH
September 176
House structure October 527
November 812
East South West North Total R-value U = 1/R December 1,209
Window areas 64 162 35 10 271 ft2 1.92 0.5208 January 1,421
External walls 1,898 ft2 21.37 0.0468 February 1,190
Roof 1,520 ft2 31.97 0.0313 March 1,004
April 603
May 285
Add infiltration: I = 4,220 BTUs/(day.oF) → HL = 6,660 + 4,220 = 10,880 BTUs/(day.oF)

Compare energy demand to solar supply, month after month:

September Demand is HL x Degree-days

= (10,880 BTUs/day.oF) x (176 oF.days) = 1.915 x 106 BTUs

Supply is (SHGFeastAeast + …)(0.87 window reflection)(57% sunshine)

= (906 x 64 + 1344 x 162 + 906 x 35 + 238 x 10)(0.87)(0.57)
= 153,631 BTUs/day
There are 30 days in September → 153,631 x 30 = 4.609 x 106 BTUs

Good news: Supply is more than enough to cover the demand !

Similar calculations for the remaining heating months of the year. Results are:

Energy Solar Values in million BTUs

demand supply Difference for each month

September 1.915 4.609 + 2.694

October 5.734 4.873 - 0.861
In winter, solar energy is
November 8.835 3.723 - 5.112
rarely enough, but it
December 13.154 3.653 - 9.501 does make a significant
January 15.460 3.914 - 11.546 contribution.
February 12.947 4.599 - 8.348
The danger is to provide
too much heat the rest
March 10.924 4.845 - 6.079 of the year.
April 6.560 3.814 - 2.746 Shading is essential.
May 3.101 3.676 +0.575

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For example, what happens if one increases the window area by 20% on the
southern side of the building?

This does two things, one negative and one positive:

1. It increases the heat loss because the R-value of a window is less than
that of a wall (R value drops from 21.97 to 1.92):

→ HL increases from 10,822 to 11,192 BTUs/(day . oF)

→ October demand increases from 5.703 to 5.898 million BTUs

2. It increases the capture of solar energy:

→ October solar gain increases from 4.873 to 5.633 million BTUs

The October gap is reduced from 0.830 to 0.265 million BTUs

a reduction of 68%.

There is a better way to get more sun without more conductive heat loss…

In the winter months, when the solar energy input fails to meet the building
demand, additional heat must be supplied from a furnace or other source
(solar panels on roof? geothermal heat?)

Alternatively, one can decrease the demand by increasing the insulation of

the building, for example, by drawing curtains at night.

or …

one can be clever and get more free energy from the sun !

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 Except for a small amount of
reflection, most of the solar
radiation goes through glass
because glass is almost perfectly
transparent to radiation in the
visible spectrum. (We can see
through windows!)

This radiation is not absorbed by

the air in the room but rather by
the opaque surfaces it falls upon,
like the floor or walls.

The receiving surface heats up

and, in steady state, emits back
the same amount of heat, mostly
through convection.

Heat is lost through conductive

loss through the window
(small R-value).

But since glazing creates a relatively large conductive heat loss, consider
placing a thick piece of better insulating material just inside

Absorber-storage wall (Trombe wall):

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Improved Trombe wall:

With vent holes

through the storage
wall to bring some of
the heat from the
greenhouse into the
living space.

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A variation…
Absorber wall combined with greenhouse:

The greenhouse may be stifling during the day and too cold at night
for comfort, but it may be just fine to grow plants … and food, too!

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 Should interior space get too hot, a passive solution is the

Solar Chimney

A solar chimney — often referred to as a thermal chimney — is a way of improving the

natural ventilation of buildings by using convection of air heated by passive solar energy.
A simple description of a solar chimney is that of a vertical shaft utilizing solar energy to
enhance the natural stack ventilation through a building.

The solar chimney has been in use for centuries, in the Middle East and Near East by the
Persians, as well as in Europe by the Romans. (Source: Wikipedia)

Examples of solar chimneys

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Past use closer to home

Waverly Plantation in Columbus, Mississippi

Then, one can think of saving the extra daytime heat for use at night.
J. Kachadorian The Passive Solar House, 1997, page 39.

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Heat storage: Thermal mass inside a building is
adequate for smoothing day-night
temperature variations.

Heat content = c x M x T For smoothing seasonal temperature

↑ ↑ ↑ fluctuations (i.e., storing summer heat for
heat mass temperature use in the following winter), one needs to
capacity resort to a geothermal system.
(BTUs/lb oF) (lb) (oF)

In buildings, we deal with volumes more than masses:

M = x V  
↑ ↑
density volume
(lb/ft3) (ft3)

Heat content = c x  x V x T  = H x V x T

where H = c x  = specific heat per volume, in BTUs/(ft3 x oF)

Specific heat H of various substances and materials

On a volume basis:

Air 0.0182 ← extremely low

Water 62.44 ← very high

Concrete 30.1 ← quite high

Concrete block 28.8
Sheetrock 13.0

Plywood 9.86
Particle board 15.5

Asphalt roofing shingle 21.0

values in BTUs/(ft3 x oF)

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 When the sun shines on a wall or floor:

d
H V T   Q A
dt
dT
HV Q A
dt
where

Q  I cos  for vertical wall

Q  I sin  for horizontal floor

V  Ad

Heat received from sun:

A floor I sin 

Heat flowing from floor to room:

A floorU (T floor  Troom )

Heat through walls, etc.:

HL (Troom  Toutside )

Heat budgets for floor and room air:

dT floor
H floorV floor   A floor I sin   A floorU (T floor  Troom )
dt
dTroom
H airVroom   A floorU (T floor  Troom )  HL (Troom  Toutside )
dt

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Specific heat of air is almost nil,
and we can assume steady state for the room budget:

0  A floorU (T floor  Troom )  HL (Troom  Toutside )

of which the solution is:

= instant adaptation of
A floorUT floor  HL Toutside air temperature to a
Troom  weighted average
A floorU  HL between floor and
outside temperatures

HL T floor  HL Toutside
T floor  Troom 
A floorU  HL

The heat budget for the floor then becomes:

dT floor A floorU HL
H floorV floor  A floor I sin   (T floor  Toutside )
dt A floorU  HL
thermal inertia gain from sun loss to the outside

Heat exchange between floor and room:

Warm air created next to floor rises and convects through the room:

Q  AUT (Newton’s Law of convection)

 A floorU (T floor  Troom )
↑
U  0.20 T 
0.33
U due to convection

If the heated surface is a vertical wall:

Q  AUT
 AwallU (Twall  Troom ) U  0.31 T 
0.33

In these expressions, T is in oF and U in BTUs/(ft2 x hour x oF).

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Examples of calculations:

1. Average indoor temperature is adequate but swings too much from day to night.
→ Not enough thermal mass

Room
temperature

2. Indoor temperature well smoothed between day and night

but not high enough in average
→ Not enough solar intake; need to increase glazing

Room
temperature

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3. About correct balance of solar intake and thermal mass:

Room
temperature

Final remarks

#1

It is important to keep in mind that in a passive-solar design, the building

must accomplish the following three functions simultaneously:

1. Collection of solar energy

not too little and not too much
with appropriate glazing, overhangs, etc.

2. Storage of energy collected

with appropriate amount and placement of thermal mass

3. Distribution of heat
with facilitation of natural ventilation into the desired areas.

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 Final remarks

#2

Passive solar energy is difficult to control in practice:

- Glare needs to be avoided.

- In the warm season, solar heating is often excessive and needs to be

offset by active cooling; air-conditioning is energy intensive and costly.

- In attempting to keep a sunlit area of a large room comfortable, one

often runs the risk to have shaded spaces overcooled.

- Solar radiation landing directly on people affects their thermal confort.

(Source: ASHRAE Journal, July 2018, page 12)

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