Title: Thermodynamic analysis and life cycle assessment of the heating strategies in historical buildings: a case study

Authors: Aysegul Abusoglu; Murad S. Sedeeq

Addresses: Department of Mechanical Engineering, University of Gaziantep, 27310 Gaziantep, Turkey ' Department of Mechanical Engineering, University of Gaziantep, 27310 Gaziantep, Turkey

Abstract: This paper presents the thermodynamic analysis and life cycle assessment (LCA) of the heating strategies in historical buildings. We evaluated two main systems used in historical buildings to provide heat: a central heating system, which is based on a method of heating the whole air volume within the building, and a localised heating system, which is based on a method of supplying the desired amount of heat to the individual occupants. After evaluating both systems in a historic mosque, we found that using a modern localised heating system like the carbon film heating, a comfortable temperature can be maintained while saving 22.4 MWh of electricity annually, compared with a conventional central heating system. Moreover, the carbon film heating system can reduce stress on the environment by 60% when compared with the conventional heat pump system.

Keywords: historic buildings; historic mosques; energy analysis; exergy analysis; thermodynamic analysis; life cycle assessment; LCA; central heating; localised heating; carbon film heating; heat pumps; building heating.

DOI: 10.1504/IJEX.2014.059513

International Journal of Exergy, 2014 Vol.14 No.1, pp.60 - 82

Received: 07 Dec 2012
Accepted: 25 Feb 2013
Published online: 07 Aug 2014 *

Full-text access for editors Full-text access for subscribers Purchase this article Comment on this article