To understand the importance of heat balance, we need to highlight that a building’s thermal conditions are the ones defining the users’ comfort to a great extent. In general terms, that will rely on the heat gains and losses, depending on the moment.

Thus, heat balance means that if heat gains are higher than heat losses, the building will need to be heated, while if there is an opposite situation (losses higher than gains), we will need to install artificial conditioning systems (cooling and heating units).

But how is the heat gained and lost?

Heat gains are due to different factors.  One of them is the solar radiation penetrating the building through joinery, enclosures, etc. Other players contributing to that gain are the building’s users, who are constantly emitting heat, operational appliances and artificial lighting equipment.

Heat losses are due to the indoor-outdoor or adjacent rooms temperature difference.  When planning the project, it is vital to be aware of constructive elements transmitting heat which should be verified by convection, conduction and radiation techniques.

At SGarq we aimed at high energy-efficient comfortable buildings with nearly-zero energy use based on the Passivhaus standard.