Indoor climatic control level, energy demand and CO2 emissions in museum environments

Any work of art, either displayed in a museum or as an integral part of a monumental historical building, needs a controlled microclimate, mostly in terms of temperature and relative humidity, for its preservation. The thermo-hygrometric conditions surrounding the artifacts, and in particular their rapid changes over time, are critical for preservation. Therefore, environmental monitoring has gained more and more importance with regard to the techniques of data survey, processing, and analysis. By applying a long-term approach, a study was developed in order to analyze the microclimate quality of the indoor environment and the corresponding energy demand and CO2 emissions during the operational period of a museum case study, through energy simulation performed by a building energy simulation software. The numerical study aimed at examining the existing relationships among the microclimate level requirements, the potential of the “building-plants system” control, energy consumptions and CO2 emissions has been carried out. The investigations are applied to different indoor climatic control levels suggested by the “ASHRAE classes”, and enables a better understanding of the factors influencing the thermo-hygrometric category of an environment