Sustainable Heating or Cooling and Ventilation of Affordable Zero-energy Housing

Abstract

This paper updates the ongoing research, by simulation and experimentation for a sustainable low-energy method to heat or cool and ventilate affordable housing. Renewable sources are used to heat or cool water which is circulated to low temperature (22-25°C) radiators (LTRs) on inside faces to make houses as thermally comfortable as caves. In cool (15°C annual average temperature) Melbourne, Australia, water from 100m-deep VGHEs has been measured at 22-24°C. Using the 25-30°C increase in ground temperature per kilometre depth given by the International Panel on Climate Change, the depth should be about 200m. Most of the inhabited places have annual average temperature of more than 0°C, and t..