Plant refurbishment in historical buildings turned into museum

Suitable conditioning plant design is only one aspect of a wide problem that concerns thermo-physical building performance and then building envelope characteristics quality. This is really very important when a building is a museum and work of art at the same time, like the Hall of the Five Hundred that is the object of our study. Its need for conditioning is due to its prestige utilization for public meetings; but it must be seen as connected to different interventions for energy saving and rational energy use. Because of the architectural structure of the Hall and lack of space for plant allocation, the solution proposed in this paper is based on the minimum impact and reversibility concept. A movable platform on the existing floor that can hold all plants was proposed. This thin radiant panel solution was studied by a CFD simulation based on the finite volume method in transient conditions. In order to obtain reliable information concerning the fluid dynamic and thermal fields, the simulations were performed by using experimental data carried out by the Opificio delle Pietre Dure as comparison. (C) 2006 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.