Geometric focalization of sunrays: residential building applications

Summarization: The study scopes to optimize the use of sun reflectors (SR) and integrate them to residential housing buildings. When there is light from the sun the temperature rises. With the reflectivity panels the sun can be directed to specific areas, using light concentrating techniques. The purpose of these SRs is to focalize the light of the sun into specific places of the building that are considered as energy production systems of the building such as solar chimney or greenhouse. The aim of this thesis project is to measure the temperature before the reflection (ignore the scattering of the light) and after, in order to test the energy that will be produced through the thermal and cooling loads of the building in the urban or suburban site. Methodologically, the testing tools that are used are program simulation and a physical model. At first, a residential building is chosen that can be a typical housing unit of a city centre but also of a semi-rural area. Trnsys 17 software is used to count the thermal and cooling loads of the building, the effects of the sun reflectors, as well as the energy produced. The concentrating reflectivity panels are tested concerning the shape, in order to choose the most efficient one. After deciding on the shape of the reflector, the model is optimised and a 1/10 scale physical model is made in order to cross the simulation results. The last part of the thesis project is the architectural integration of the energy system. A modular system taken from nature is placed in different parts of the building taking into consideration architectural and environmental parameters