Italy

BET Cell and Outdoor Test Cells at POLITO (Politecnico di Torino).

The test facility called “BETcell”, (acronym for Building Envelope Test Cell), is a climatic chamber aimed at characterising the thermo-energetic performance of building envelope components and systems in both steady-state and dynamic boundary conditions, in a controllable laboratory environment. To this end the climatic chamber is built as two separate environments separated by a frame that can house the specimens to be tested.

BET and Outdoor Test Cells will allow:

• the development of simplified analysis and design tools able to aid designers in assessing the behaviour of the proposed systems under actual working conditions and to certify their energy and environmental performance;
• the experimental validation in large scale laboratory tests in controlled conditions through measurements in the climatic chamber;
• the assessment of the real energy performance of newly developed products when applied in buildings under actual operating conditions.

The real energy performance under actual operating conditions as well as the evaluation of aspects related to the technical feasibility will be investigated through a long term monitoring on two sample rooms (with and without the insulation plaster/filler/render) in representative residential buildings located in Turin and owned/managed by ATC/CASE, the social housing provider in Torino’s area and surrounds.