The laboratory conducts thermophysical characterisation of innovative building envelope materials and components and performs thermal comfort analysis in both indoor and outdoor environments. It also performs experimental evaluations of the energy performances of underground heat exchangers for shallow geothermal applications.

Instrumental equipment

• ‘Hot Disk’ for measuring thermal conductivity and diffusivity of solid and homogeneous materials using the Transient Plane Source technique
• ‘Dual Air Vented Thermal Box’ for measuring the thermal resistance of innovative building components using the heat flow meter method, and for the performance characterisation of porous, breathing walls under both steady-state and transient conditions
• Portable instrumentation for environmental monitoring of thermal comfort parameters (operative temperature, air temperature and humidity, air velocity, etc.)
• ‘Sand Box’ for investigating shallow geothermal systems, featuring a scaled reproduction of geo-exchangers in soil under controlled conditions, with varying degrees of saturation and groundwater movement