Energy Consumption and Indoor Climate Measurements in New Low-Energy Houses

The CLASS1 project commenced in 2007 and involves 5 countries: Denmark, Estonia, France, Italy and Romania. Originally, 442 dwellings, a kindergarten and an activity centre for elderly people were to be designed and constructed as "low-energy class 1" houses according to requirements set by the Municipality of Egedal/Denmark, for the CONCERTO community. This means that the energy consumption is 50% below the energy requirements set by the Danish Building Regulation of 2008 (reference). 65 apartments and about 50 single-family houses were constructed. Due to the financial crisis, about 240 new dwellings and a CO2-neutral district heating network will not be constructed within the timeframe of the project Therefore, a contingency plan was developed introducing the renovation of public buildings and large-scale implementation of solar cells on public buildings of the municipality.
The CLASS 1 project used the requirements to low-energy buildings as a driving force for the technological development of 6 different key building components/technologies: windows, slab and foundation insulation systems, bio-mass gasification, local district heating distribution networks, ventilation heat recovery combined with heat pumps and a Building Energy Management Systems.
The overall concept of a CONCERTO project, to combine energy efficiency with renewable energy supply, is thus reached through the combination of low-energy new buildings,the improvement of the energy efficiency of public buildings and PV systems. The paper describes the results obtained for energy and indoor environment evaluations. A cross reference exists to another paper submitted for the conference on "Occupant experiences and satisfaction with new low-energy houses".