An arctic low-energy house as experimental setup for studies of heat dynamics of buildings

This paper addresses the difficulties in pinpointing reasons for unexpectedly high energy consumption in construction, and in low-energy houses especially. Statistical methods are applied to improve the insight into the energy performance and heat dynamics of a building based on consumption records and weather data. Dynamical methods separate influences from outdoor temperature, solar radiation, and wind on the energy consumption in the building. The studied building is a low-energy house in Sisimiut, Greenland. Weather conditions like large temperature differences between indoors and outdoors throughout long winters, strong winds, and very different circumstances regarding solar radiation compared to areas where low-energy houses are usually built, make the location very interesting for modeling and testing purposes. In 2011 new measurement equipment was installed in the house, which will be used to develop more detailed models of the heat dynamics and energy performance in relation to different meteorological variables, heating systems, and user behavior. This type of models is known as a graybox model and is been introduced in this paper.