Research On The Impacts Of Climate And Built Environment On Human Thermal Adaptation

Thermal adaptation has important influence on thermal comfort in builtenvironment. Studies on thermal adaptation theory and model can make contributions tothe establishment and modification of indoor thermal environment standards. At present,comprehensive studies on the impacts of climate and built environment on thermaladaptation are seldom in China, and since the well known adaptive model establishedby foreign scholars doesn’t include field study data from China, it cannot be introducedinto China’s standards. Besides, the form of the mentioned model is simple that itdoesn’t fully show the mechanism of thermal adaptation, so there are still conflicts on it.In order to solve the above problems, the systemic thermal comfort field studies werecarried out in this thesis. Impacts of area, season and environment control on thermaladaptation were analyzed, while the thermal adaptation mechanism was discussed. Theresearch work was as follows:Firstly, field studies were conducted in public buildings in Beijing during spring,summer and winter, in order to analyze the seasonal character of thermal adaptation. Itwas found that the neutral temperatures of people are different among seasons. Insummer the neutral temperature is the highest, while in winter it is the lowest. Peoplecan accept a wide temperature range. If the indoor temperature deviates from neutral,people’s thermal adaptability will play a role to improve thermal sensation.Secondly, two comparisons were made to see the impact of environment control onthermal adaptation. One comparison was between air-conditioned and nonair-conditioned buildings in summer, while the other was between central heating andindividual heating buildings in winter. The results show that environment control canaffect thermal adaptation through behavior and psychology. Effective control methodsmay result in good thermal comfort evaluation.Thirdly, the studies of public buildings in Harbin, Shanghai and Shenzhen duringwinter were taken simultaneously. Together with the data got from Beijing, differencesof thermal adaptation between areas were revealed. The neutral temperatures ofShanghai and Shenzhen citizens are lower than those of Harbin and Beijing. Comparedto people in north China, citizens in Shanghai has stronger adaptation to cold environment since lack of heating during winter. In Shenzhen, the indoor temperatureduring winter is also low, but people do not form enough adaptation since winter time isvery short.Finally, the mechanism of the current adaptive model was discussed, and the timescale of thermal adaptation process was confirmed. Besides, the frame of thermaladaptation theory was established. Taken Beijing as an example, the control range ofindoor temperature for different seasons was suggested.The thermal comfort field study work and the conclusions in this thesis couldprovide the theoretical basis and the data support for the establishment and modificationof indoor environment standards in China.