Thermal conductance measurement of windows: An innovative radiative method

Heat transfer through window surfaces is one of the most important contributions to energy losses in buildings. Therefore, great efforts are made to design new window frames and glass assemblies with low thermal conductance. At the same time, it is also necessary to develop accurate measurement techniques in thermal characterisation of the above-mentioned building components. In this paper the authors show an innovative measurement method mainly based on radiative heat transfer (instead of the traditional convective one) which allows window thermal conductance measurements with corresponding uncertainty budget evaluation. The authors used the 3D finite volume software FLUENT® to design the experimental apparatus. The numerical results have been employed for the system optimisation and metrological characterisation.