Construction nodes in the EPB-regulation - EP-bridge & PAThB2010
Each building has a large number of different construction nodes (e.g. wall-roof junctions) and many of those are unique, being detailed specifically for that building. Badly detailed construction nodes can lead to thermal bridges and have a large impact on the heat losses of well insulated buildings. Construction nodes should thus be taken into account when calculating the energy performance of buildings. However, analysing all those possible thermal bridges by means of detailed thermal computer simulations is not feasible in common building projects.
Therefore, a pragmatic approach was developed to take them into account in the official energy performance calculation method in Belgium (EPB-annex VIII). The approach includes a new method for evaluating the thermal quality of construction nodes by means of three simple rules of thumb. This was developed in the projects EP-bridge and PAThB2010 project, jointly by BBRI (WTCB/CSTC), UGent, KU Leuven, UCL, ULg and Sint-Lucas Architectuur.
Project Info
Research group: Building Physics
Start date: 01-01-2009
Researchers: Marc Delghust and Arnold Janssens