Thermal Performance Analysis of Trombe Wall (Case Study of Higher Institute of Translation and Interpreting Building in Damascus)

Abstract

In light of the increasing fuel prices, their scarcity, and the possibility of their depletion in the future, the need has become urgent to adopt certain measures of designing and constructing buildings in a way that reduces energy consumption and thus decreases the percentage of gas emissions resulting from burning fuel, while ensuring thermal comfort for the residents of those buildings. Among numerous passive technologies, Trombe wall (thermal storage wall) is one of the classical passive solar heating, which has the features of simple construction, high efficiency, and zero operation cost. In this research, the thermal performance of Trombe wall located in the Higher Institute of Translation and Interpreting Building in Damascus was simulated and the possible modifications to the wall were evaluated in order to optimize performance based on advanced simulation packages (TRNSYS). Results showed that when insulating the roof and increasing the area of Trombe wall to 70 % of the southern wall, the heating demand of the studied thermal zone decreases by 94 %. The research also presented a set of recommendations related to wall design parameters and their impact on reducing heating energy.