Deliverable 1.1 published – ‘Priority Factors for Estimating Comfort’ (COV)

In deliverable 1.1, led by Coventry University, the priority factors for estimating comfort have been researched and described. It is a precursor to deliverable D1.3, which will provide the DOMUS comfort model and is intended to communicate information about which factors are important to other work packages and parts of the consortium. By and large, the method for selecting factors is based on a literature review on thermal comfort models and related aspects.

A key finding is that traditional models, such as PMV and SET*, do not cater for substantially different thermal environments for different parts of the body, whereas newer models, such as Local Mean Vote (LMV), ISO 14505, and the Berkeley Comfort Model (BCM) do. Furthermore, the trend in the built environment is to move away from PMV and towards adaptive comfort models that consider recent temperature history.

Apart from thermal aspects, the relevance and importance of acoustic effects are highlighted along with lighting, scent, and air quality. Cognitive and psychophysiological factors are also included.