Comparative study on thermal comfort of people with different body mass index in colder environment

The traditional thermal comfort standards do not consider the demand for thermal comfort of the growing overweight or obese population in China, which may have an important impact on human comfort and building energy saving. This paper investigates the differences in subjective and physiological responses of people with different body mass index (BMI) in the colder environment. The results show that the average skin temperature of people with high BMI is significantly lower than that of people with low BMI, and decreases with the decrease of temperature. The metabolic rate of people with high BMI is lower than that of people with low BMI in the colder environment, although there is no significant difference, it would lead to a higher percentage of thermal dissatisfaction than people with low BMI. When predicting thermal sensation, it is necessary to predict the thermal sensation of different BMI people, respectively.