Investigating the effects of individual characteristics on thermal sensation by individual three-node model

Comprehensive evaluation of individual thermal sensation could help engineers to optimum design heating and cooling systems, in order to reduce energy consumption. Differences in the persons’ individual parameters such as age, gender, weight, height and basal metabolic rate have a significant effect on the human body thermoregulation and thermal sensation. Since the individual parameters have not been considered in standard thermal comfort models, they don’t lead to accurate results for specific individuals. In this study, the impact of individual characteristics, including weight, height and gender, on thermal sensation have been evaluated separately and discussed to improve the prediction of thermal comfort for different persons. Individual three-node model has been accurately estimated thermal sensation of the bare and clothed parts of the body by considering individual physiological differences in human thermoregulation. The model has been verified against the analytical and experimental results where a good agreement was found. Sensitivity analysis revealed that the differences in BMI’s persons could result in a variance of 1.5 unit in calculation of thermal sensation. Thermal sensation results show that females, compared with males, are more sensitive at 15℃ (as operative temperature) and the difference, depending on BMI’s subjects, is within the range of 0.27-0.9 units.