Experiments of indoor thermal environment control during cooling operation based on thermal sensation and temperature set point

Proposes an indoor thermal environment control methodology based on thermal sensation. In order to compare the differences of indoor thermal environment control between thermal sensation and temperature set point value, establishes a test-bed and conducts a series of experiments to compare their control performances, user satisfaction, productivity and system energy consumption in the cooling operation. The comparison results show that both of the two control methods can achieve similar user satisfaction and productivity without statistically significant difference. However, the thermal sensation based control can achieve more stable thermal environment. Further, for the office room with about ten occupants and equipped with split air conditioners, the thermal sensation based control consumes 15.3% less energy than temperature set point based control.