Energy Performance Assessment of and Advanced Integrated Façade through Experimental Data Analysis

This paper deals with the experimental assessment of the energy performance of two Advanced Integrated Façade modules (AIF) characterized by two very similar configurations. The two AIF modules were installed on the south-exposed façade of an outdoor test cell facility (a real-scale mockup of an office building) and continuous measurements were carried out for more than one year. Data collected during the experimental campaign were analyzed to evaluate the energy performance and thermo-physical behaviour of the AIF modules. The performances of the two systems were assessed by comparison and by means of conventional and advanced synthetic metrics. The results of the activity point out the different performances of the two configurations, which only differs on the inner-side glazing (a stratified single clear glass pane vs a stratified low-e double glazed unit). It was demonstrated that just a single additional glass layer can contribute to substantially improve the energy performance of a quite complex façade technology. On average, the façade configuration with the stratified low-e double glazed unit shows the abatement of heat loss and of solar gain of about 30% during the whole year. Moreover, the reliability of some conventional and less conventional metrics in assessing the performance of dynamic façade technologies was also investigated. The results confirm that conventional metrics are not fully reliable when they are used to assess advanced building envelope components with high level of dynamic.