Parametric analysis of BIPV facades on outdoor comfort

Abstract While the promotion of Building Integrated Photovoltaics (BIPV) as a key strategy for the energy transition is widely accepted, the consequences of a large-scale BIPV deployment on the urban microclimate are not yet fully understood. Furthermore, the few existing studies addressing this issue do not lead to a consistent conclusion. This study, therefore, aims to investigate how different levels of BIPV deployment on building facades affect outdoor thermal comfort (OTC) for pedestrians in urban areas during the warmest day of the year using a parametric approach based on simulations. Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) simulations were conducted using Envi-met for 80 urban configurations in two climatic zones. The results indicate that the impact of BIPV on urban air temperatures can vary throughout the day, with temperature differences ranging from -0.21 to +0.46 °C for Zurich and -0.23 to +0.42 °C for Singapore, compared to scenarios without BIPV at pedestrian level in front of building facades. Among the studied parameters, ground surface material and street width were found to be the most influential, with an average increase of 1.76 and 0.37 C in air temperature at 12 pm, respectively.

Keywords: Urban microclimate, Urban heat, BIPV, Outdoor thermal comfort, Decision trees, Feature importance.