Analytical periodic solution for the study of thermal performance

and optimum insulation thickness of building walls in Tunisia

Naouel Daouas
*
, Zaineb Hassen, Habib Ben Aissia
Ecole Nationale dIngnieurs de Monastir, Dpartement de Gnie Energtique, Rue Ibn El Jazzar, 5019 Monastir, Tunisia
a r t i c l e i n f o
Article history:
Received 9 June 2008
Accepted 10 September 2009
Available online 16 September 2009
Keywords:
Optimum insulation thickness
Analytical solution
Cooling loads
Energy savings
a b s t r a c t
In Tunisia, the energy consumption in the building sector is rapidly increasing. Recently, very high elec-
tric energy consumption, used for air-conditioning loads, is reached during summer days. Insulation of
building walls is recently applied with an insulation layer thickness typically ranging between 4 cm
and 5 cm, regardless of the climatic conditions, type and cost of insulation material and other economic
parameters. In the present study, an optimum insulation thickness is determined under steady periodic
conditions. An analytical method, based on Complex Finite Fourier Transform (CFFT), is extended to rig-
orously estimate the yearly cooling transmission loads for two types of insulation materials and two typ-
ical wall structures. Estimated loads are used as inputs to a life-cycle cost analysis in order to determine
the optimum thickness of the insulation layer. Results show that, the most protable case is the stone/
brick sandwich wall and expanded polystyrene for insulation, with an optimum thickness of 5.7 cm. In
this case, energy savings up to 58% are achieved with a payback period of 3.11 years. The thermal perfor-
mance of the walls under optimal conditions is also investigated. Then, comparison of the present study
with the degree-days method is performed for different values of indoor design temperature.
2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
1. Introduction
At present, the building sector (residential/commercial) in Tuni-
sia is the largest energy consumer following the industrial and the
transportation sectors. It is expected to be the rst energy con-
sumer by 2020. The increase in energy consumption is due, on
the one hand, to the deterioration of the thermal quality of recent
constructions and, on the other hand, to the improvement in
household standard of living. A signicant increase in summer
comfort requirements is translated into a great boom in the use
of air conditioning with an average annual evolution of the number
of air conditioners of about 28% between 1999 and 2004. This
induced a very high electric energy consumption which reached
a new peak during summer days.
Recently and due to the environmental changes, attention has
been drawn to summer comfort by accounting for cooling loads
and reducing the heat transfer to the building using an optimum
insulation thickness.
Bojic et al. [1] predicted the yearly cooling loads in two residen-
tial apartments in Hong Kong and studied their variations with re-
spect to the thickness and the position of the thermal insulation
layer placed in external walls. Insulation of a typical house in Qatar
was investigated by Al-Khawaja [2] in order to reduce transmission
loads to the building during the hot season. Recently, Bolattrk [3]
calculated the optimum insulation thickness for building walls
with respect to both heating and cooling loads. He considered four
different climate zones in Turkey and found that optimization of
the insulation thickness based on cooling loads is more appropriate
for energy savings in Turkeys warmest zone.
Different methods were applied in order to estimate yearly heat
transmission loads which are the main inputs required in the anal-
ysis of optimum insulation thickness. One of the most widely used
in the literature is the degree-days concept [46] which is a simple
and crude model applied under static conditions. More efcient
models taking into account the transient behaviour of the building
system were handled with numerical and analytical methods. In
previous studies, only dynamic transient models based on numer-
ical methods have dealt with optimum insulation thickness [79].
Analytical methods, mostly based on Fourier series analysis, were
limited to the study of transient one-dimensional heat transfer in
composite walls subjected to time-dependent outdoor conditions
[10,11].
The present study deals with the determination of optimum
insulation thickness for external walls of buildings in Tunisia. Opti-
mization is based on an economic model where a life-cycle cost
analysis is carried out using two types of insulation materials
and two typical wall structures. An analytical method based on
Complex Finite Fourier Transform (CFFT) is adopted for the
solution of the transient heat transfer through multilayer walls
1359-4311/$ - see front matter 2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.applthermaleng.2009.09.009
* Corresponding author. Tel.: +216 73 500 244; fax: +216 73 500 514.
E-mail address: naou.daouas@gnet.tn (N. Daouas).
Applied Thermal Engineering 30 (2010) 319326
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submitted to periodic ambient temperature and solar radiation
specic to the city of Tunis. Yumrutas et al. [12] were the rst
who used this technique for evaluating heat transfer through mul-
tilayer walls and roofs. Their study was limited to the calculation of
hourly heat gains and inner surface temperatures for a 24 h period
of one representative summer day for different wall structures
with and without insulation. The same analytical methodology
was also used by Yumrutas et al. [13] in order to calculate time
lag and decrement factors.
In this paper, the application of CFFT technique is extended to
rigorously estimate annual cooling loads by integrating over a
24 h period the hourly transmission loads and by adding the ob-
tained daily total loads over the whole summer days (June
September). The optimum insulation thickness is calculated
based on the estimated cooling transmission loads. Then, result-
ing energy savings and payback periods are computed and com-
pared. The thermal performance of the walls under optimal
conditions is also investigated. The same life-cycle cost analysis
is applied using the degree-days method and comparison with
the present work results is performed for different base indoor
temperatures.
2. Analytical analysis
The present analysis is concerned with the one-dimensional
transient heat conduction through a composite wall consisting of
N parallel layers of different materials and thicknesses (Fig. 1).
Considering the medium isotropic and homogeneous with no heat
generation, and the thermal properties independent of tempera-
ture, the heat transfer through each layer of the composite wall
is governed by the following heat conduction equation:
@
2
T
j
@x
2
j

1
a
j
@T
j
@t
for 0 < x
j
< L
j
and j 1; 2; . . . ; N 1
Thermal contact between the layers is considered perfect. This
condition is expressed (for j = 1, 2, . . . , N 1) as follows:
T
j
x
j
L
j
; t T
j1
x
j1
0; t 2
k
j
@T
j
@x
j

x
j
L
j
k
j1
@T
j1
@x
j1

x
j1
0
3
The inside surface is exposed to the indoor air which is kept at a
xed design temperature T
i
. The outside surface is subjected to a
periodic solar radiation ux q
s
(t) and is exposed to ambient air
which have a periodic temperature variation T
o
(t). Average values
of combined convection and radiation heat transfer coefcients h
i
and h
o
are used for both inside and outside wall surfaces, respec-
tively. Assuming that the surrounding surfaces are at the same
temperature as the ambient air, the corresponding boundary con-
ditions are:
k
1
@T
1
@x
1

x
1
0
h
i
T
i
T
1
x
1
0; t 4
k
N
@T
N
@x
N

x
N
L
N
h
o
T
N
x
N
L
N
; t T
o
t kq
s
t 5
The periodicity condition is given, for a time period p = 24 h, by:
T
j
x
j
; t T
j
x
j
; t p for j 1; 2; . . . ; N 6
Inside Outside
T
i
T
o
(t)
h
i
h
o
q
s
(t)
x
1
x
2
x
j
x
N
o
o
o
o
L
2 L
1
L
j L
N
T
1
( x
1
,t)
Layer 1
k
1
,
1
Layer N
k
N
,
N
T
2
(x
2
,t) T
j
(x
j
,t) T
N
(x
N
,t)
Layer 2
k
2
,
Layer j
k
j
,
j

2
Fig. 1. Model of N-layered composite wall.
Nomenclature
A
s
annual energy savings (TND/m
2
)
b payback period (years)
C cost (TND)
COP coefcient of performance of air-conditioning system
DD degree-days (C days)
h combined heat transfer coefcient (W/m
2
K)
i complex argument
k thermal conductivity (W/m K)
L layer thickness (m)
L
opt
optimum insulation thickness (m)
n lifetime of building (years)
N number of layers of composite wall
p period (h)
q heat ux density (W/m
2
)
q
s
solar radiation (W/m
2
)
Q
c
yearly cooling transmission load (kW h/m
2
)
r effective interest rate
t time (s)
T temperature (K)
TND Tunisian Dinar (1 TND = 0.86 US$)
U total heat transfer coefcient of wall (W/m
2
K)
x coordinate direction normal to wall (m)
Greek symbols
a thermal diffusivity (m
2
/s)
k solar absorptivity of outside surface of wall
Subscripts and superscripts
el electric
enr energy
i inside
ins insulation
j layer number
k Fourier transform coefcient
o outside
t total
320 N. Daouas et al. / Applied Thermal Engineering 30 (2010) 319326
The periodic solution of the resulting set of equations is
obtained by applying the Complex Finite Fourier Transform (CFFT)
to the temperature of each layer j of the composite wall as follows
[12,13]:
T
j
z
j
; s

k1
k1
T
k
j
z
j
expix
k
s 7
where z
j

x
j
L
j
; s
t12
p
; x
k
2pk and
T
k
j
z
j

1=2
1=2
T
j
z
j
; s expix
k
sds 8
Indeed, application of the CFFT [Eq. (7)] provides a transformed
form of the dimensionless problem formulation [12,13], which
leads straight to the solution:
T
k
j
z
j
A
k
j
z
j
B
k
j
for k 0; j 1; 2; . . . ; N 9a
T
k
j
z
j
C
k
j
sinhc
k
j
z
j
D
k
j
coshc
k
j
z
j
for k0; j 1; 2; . . . ; N 9b
where c
k
j
1 i

x
k
e
j
2

, e
j

L
2
j
a
j
p
and A
j
, B
j
, C
j
and D
j
are unknown
coefcients determined from boundary conditions [12,13].
Numerical calculations are performed using a Matlab com-
puter program. The summation in Eq. (7) is calculated with a
nite number of k. We used 20 frequencies which was sufcient
to get the converged temperature. Indeed, when reaching this
number, the temperature value change is reduced to less than
10
5
. Heat transmission from the wall to the indoor space is eval-
uated as follows:
q
i
t h
i
T
1
z
1
0; t T
i
10
3. Thermal performance of uninsulated walls
We consider two typical uninsulated wall structures commonly
used in Tunisian constructions (Fig. 2) and subjected to the same
climatic and boundary conditions. Actual measurements of outside
ambient temperature for the city of Tunis are employed. The solar
radiation ux on vertical surfaces is calculated based on the ASH-
RAE clear-sky model [14] which provides reliable predictions nota-
bly for summer months when the sky is usually clear [15]. The
three components of solar radiation (direct, diffuse and ground re-
ected) on vertical surfaces of different orientations are computed
using inputs specic to the city of Tunis (latitude: 3650
0
N, longi-
tude: 1014
0
E, standard meridian: 15E).
Furthermore, other inputs are required in the model such as
thermal properties of building materials (Table 1), the indoor de-
sign temperature kept constant at T
i
= 25 C, the absorptivity of
the outside surface taken, appropriate to light-coloured surfaces,
as k = 0.4 and the combined heat transfer coefcients set to the
constant values [12] h
i
= 9 W/m
2
K and h
o
= 22 W/m
2
K.
Climatic conditions are employed for a representative day of
July and both south-facing and west-facing walls are considered.
Fig. 3 shows that for the stone wall, uctuations of inside surface
conditions are signicantly reduced compared with those shown
by the brick wall. This behaviour is due to the good heat storage
capability of the stone material. On the other hand, the brick wall
better evacuates heat ux during the summer night characterized,
in the Mediterranean climate, by some coolness [16]. We also
note higher peak values of inside surface conditions for the
west-facing wall which receives plentiful solar radiations in the
early afternoon when the sun is low in the horizon. However,
the solar radiations that strike south-facing walls in the middle
of the day are nearly vertical and so provide a moderate
irradiation.
Wall I Wall II
Brick
C
e
m
e
n
t

p
l
a
s
t
e
r

C
e
m
e
n
t

p
l
a
s
t
e
r

2.5 cm 15 cm 2.5 cm
C
e
m
e
n
t

p
l
a
s
t
e
r
C
e
m
e
n
t

p
l
a
s
t
e
r
Stone
2.5 cm 40 cm 2.5 cm
2 cm 15 cm
T
h
e
r
m
a
l

i
n
s
u
l
a
t
i
o
n

6.5 cm 2 cm
I
n
s
i
d
e

Brick Brick
C
e
m
e
n
t

p
l
a
s
t
e
r

C
e
m
e
n
t

p
l
a
s
t
e
r

O
u
t
s
i
d
e

2 cm 30 cm
T
h
e
r
m
a
l

i
n
s
u
l
a
t
i
o
n

6.5 cm 2 cm
I
n
s
i
d
e

Brick
C
e
m
e
n
t

p
l
a
s
t
e
r

Stone
C
e
m
e
n
t

p
l
a
s
t
e
r

O
u
t
s
i
d
e

a
b
c d
Fig. 2. Typical wall structures: (a) uninsulated brick wall, (b) uninsulated stone wall, (c) insulated brick/brick sandwich wall, and (d) insulated stone/brick sandwich wall.
N. Daouas et al. / Applied Thermal Engineering 30 (2010) 319326 321
4. Optimum insulation thickness
This study is concerned with insulation of external walls. Hence,
optimization is done by considering only heat gains through these
opaque walls, since other gains do not inuence the optimum insu-
lation thickness [8]. We consider two insulated wall structures as
typically used in building construction in Tunisia (Fig. 2) and we
choose expanded polystyrene and rock wool as insulation materi-
als (Table 1).
4.1. Cooling load calculations
The hourly variation of inside surface heat ux density is inte-
grated over a 24 h period to obtain a daily total load. The procedure
is repeated for each day of summer months (JuneSeptember).
Then, the obtained daily total loads are added over the whole sea-
son in order to get the yearly cooling transmission load per square
meter of the wall surface.
First, calculations are made for Wall I (Fig. 2c) with expanded
polystyrene as the insulation material. In this case, north, south,
east and west wall orientations are compared in term of cooling
transmission load (Fig. 4a). Obviously, transmission load decreases
as the insulation thickness increases. The decrease is more impor-
tant for small insulation thicknesses. We also note that the east
and west orientations provide almost equal cooling loads which
are the highest compared with south and north orientations. The
lowest cooling load is provided by north-facing wall. Based on
these results, it is recommended to insulate east and west-facing
walls and to take advantage of plentiful solar radiation on south-
facing walls in winter. Hence, all the following results will be pre-
sented for west-facing walls and conclusions will be also valid for
east orientation.
Then, the cooling load is calculated for wall I and wall II (Fig. 2d)
by considering the two types of insulation materials. Results on
Fig. 4b show that wall II provides higher cooling loads than wall
I, notably for reduced insulation thicknesses, and that rock wool
provides higher cooling loads than expanded polystyrene. These
values are inputs to the economic model for the determination of
optimum insulation thickness.
4.2. Life-cycle economic analysis
The use of thermal insulation reduces the air-conditioning load
and, thus, the cooling energy cost in summer. However, purchase
and installation of insulation layer increase the initial cost of the
construction. Therefore, an economic analysis should be performed
in order to estimate the optimum insulation thickness which min-
imizes the total cost including the insulation and the energy con-
sumption costs.
We adopt the life-cycle analysis which computes a present va-
lue of the energy consumption cost over the life time of the build-
ing by accounting for the effects of the ination rate (rise in costs)
and the discount rate (value of money) over this period [8]. The
yearly cooling transmission load Q
c
, estimated per square meter
of wall surface, is used to determine the annual cost of energy con-
sumption per unit area given by:
Table 1
The parameters used in calculations.
Parameter Value
Cement plaster
Conductivity, k 0.72 W/m K
Diffusivity, a 4.6 10
7
m
2
/s
Brick
Conductivity, k 0.69 W/m K
Diffusivity, a 5.13 10
7
m
2
/s
Stone
Conductivity, k 1.7 W/m K
Diffusivity, a 8.5 10
7
m
2
/s
Air space
Conductivity, k
eff
0.167 W/m K
Diffusivity, a 1.5 10
4
m
2
/s
Expanded polystyrene
Conductivity, k 0.037 W/m K
Diffusivity, a 1.01 10
6
m
2
/s
Cost, C
ins
33.6 TND
a
/m
3
Rock wool
Conductivity, k 0.047 W/m K
Diffusivity, a 2.67 10
6
m
2
/s
Cost, C
ins
68.7 TND
a
/m
3
Cost of electricity, C
el
0.1375 TND
a
/kW h
Coefcient of performance, COP 2.93
Interest rate, r 8%
Lifetime, n 30 years
a
1 TND = 0.86 US$.
a
b
1 3 5 7 9 11 13 15 17 19 21 23
Time (h)
0
4
8
12
16
20
24
28
32
36
I
n
s
i
d
e

s
u
r
f
a
c
e

h
e
a
t

f
l
u
x

d
e
n
s
i
t
y

(
W
/
m
2
)
South- facing wall
West-facing wall
1 3 5 7 9 11 13 15 17 19 21 23
Time (h)
0
4
8
12
16
20
24
28
32
36
South- facing wall
West-facing wall
Brick
Stone
1 3 5 7 9 11 13 15 17 19 21 23
Time (h)
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
I
n
s
i
d
e

s
u
r
f
a
c
e

t
e
m
p
e
r
a
t
u
r
e

(

C
)
South-facing wall
West-facing wall
1 3 5 7 9 11 13 15 17 19 21 23
Time (h)
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
South-facing wall
West-facing wall
Brick
Stone
Fig. 3. Thermal performance of uninsulated walls: (a) hourly variations of inside
surface heat ux density and (b) hourly variations of inside surface temperature.
322 N. Daouas et al. / Applied Thermal Engineering 30 (2010) 319326
C
enr

Q
c
COP
C
el
11
where COP is the coefcient of performance of air-conditioning sys-
tem and C
el
is the cost of electricity in TND/kW h.
In order to obtain a present value of the cost of energy con-
sumption over a life time of n years, C
enr
is multiplied by a Present
Worth Factor (PWF) dened as [5,6]:
PWF
1
r
1
1
1 r
n

12
where r is an effective interest rate adjusted for ination rate. The
cost of insulation in TND/m
2
is given by:
C
i
C
ins
L
ins
13
where C
ins
is the cost of insulation in TND/m
3
and L
ins
is the insula-
tion thickness.
The total cost per unit area of wall is:
C
t
C
enr
PWF C
i

Q
c
COP
C
el
PWF C
ins
L
ins
14
The optimum insulation thickness is the value of L
ins
which
minimizes the total cost C
t
.
Resultinglife-cyclesavings (over n years) per unit area of thewall
surface, are calculated (in TND/m
2
) fromthe difference between the
total cost when the wall is uninsulated and the total cost when it is
insulated with optimum thickness (minimum total cost) [6].
The payback period is calculated (in number of years) as the
insulationcost, divided by the annual energy savings [4]. Annual en-
ergy savings A
s
(inTND/m
2
) are calculatedas the difference between
energy cost without insulation and energy cost with optimuminsu-
lation, divided by the PWF. In order to take into account the interest
rate over the life cycle of the building, the payback period b should
be deduced from the following expression [17]:
C
i
A
s

1
r
1
1
1 r
b

15
Values of parameters needed for the above economic calcula-
tions are given in Table 1.
4.3. Results and discussion
The electricity consumption cost, the insulation cost and the to-
tal cost are plotted versus insulation thickness (Fig. 5). As expected,
the total cost curve shows a minimum that corresponds to the
optimum insulation thickness. Results on Table 2 show that the
most protable case is the wall II with expanded polystyrene as
insulation material.
When the optimumthickness is applied, life-cycle savings reach
a maximum value. For the most protable case, this maximum is
6.17 TND/m
2
.
We intend to study the thermal performance of the composite
wall under optimal conditions. So we consider the wall I with
the optimum thickness of expanded polystyrene in the middle.
This case provided results which are close to those of the most
protable one (Table 2). On the other hand, Bricks structure is gen-
erally chosen because it is less expensive and less cumbersome
than the stone construction.
Temperature distribution within the ve layers of the wall is
shown in Fig. 6a at various times during a 24 h period. Tempera-
ture within the insulation layer shows the steepest variation which
represents the main part of temperature changes through the com-
posite wall. Therefore, much smaller temperature changes are ob-
tained in the layers on the inside which have the advantage to
reduce uctuations at the inner surface. Indeed, Fig. 6b shows that
the inside surface temperature (curve 2) is nearly constant
throughout the day. The time lag between the maximum temper-
atures reached by the outside and the inside surfaces is of about
7 h.
This optimum insulation signicantly reduces uctuations and
magnitudes of the inside surface heat ux density whose peak de-
creases by about 86%.
Insulation by leaving an air gap (L
ins
= 4 cm) between the two
brick layers is typically used in Tunisian constructions. This air
space is treated as a conductive layer with an effective thermal
conductivity given in Table 1 [8]. Fig. 7 compares monthly cooling
transmission loads calculated for this type of insulation to those
obtained using optimum insulation thicknesses of expanded poly-
styrene and rock wool (Table 2). The air gap insulation is free.
However it provides the highest cooling transmission loads. Effect
of insulation is also noted by comparison with loads of non insu-
lated wall.
Most of previous studies about optimum insulation thickness
are carried out using the degree-days model. In order to assess
0.00 0.04 0.08 0.12 0.16 0.20
Insulation Thickness (m)
0
2
4
6
8
10
12
14
16
18
20
C
o
o
l
i
n
g

t
r
a
n
s
m
i
s
s
i
o
n

l
o
a
d

(
k
W
h
/
m
2
)
West
East
South
North
a
b
0.00 0.04 0.08 0.12 0.16 0.20
Insulation Thickness (m)
1
3
5
7
9
11
13
15
17
19
21
C
o
o
l
i
n
g

t
r
a
n
s
m
i
s
s
i
o
n

l
o
a
d

(
k
W
h
/
m
2
)
Wall I
Wall II
0.00 0.04 0.08 0.12 0.16 0.20
Insulation Thickness (m)
1
3
5
7
9
11
13
15
17
19
21
Wall I
Wall II
Rock wool
Expanded polystyrene
Fig. 4. Cooling transmission load versus insulation thickness: (a) effect of wall
orientation and (b) effect of wall structure.
N. Daouas et al. / Applied Thermal Engineering 30 (2010) 319326 323
its accuracy, this concept is used in the life-cycle cost analysis and
results are compared to those of the present study for different val-
ues of the indoor design temperature T
i
. The cooling transmission
load per unit area of external wall, based on degree-days, is ex-
pressed in W/m
2
as follows:
Q
c
UDD 24 3600 16a
where DD is the cooling degree-days (in C days) and U is the total
heat transfer coefcient of the wall dened by:
U R
wt

L
ins
k
ins

1
16b
where R
wt
is the total wall thermal resistance excluding the insula-
tion layer.
The total cost [Eq. (14)] is rewritten, using the new expression
of Q
c
, as follows:
C
t

86400DD
COP
1
R
wt
L
ins
=k
ins

C
el
PWF C
ins
L
ins
17
The optimum insulation thickness L
opt
is obtained by minimiz-
ing Eq. (17). Its value is calculated by setting the derivative of C
t
,
with respect to L
ins
, equal to zero:
Table 2
Optimum insulation thickness, savings and payback period for analyzed wall
structures and insulation materials.
Optimum insulation
thickness (m)
Life-cycle
savings (%)
Payback period
(years)
Wall I
Expanded polystyrene 0.056 56.06 3.32
Rock wool 0.035 35.51 5.85
Wall II
Expanded polystyrene 0.057 58.07 3.11
Rock wool 0.037 38.01 5.55
a
b
0.00 0.05 0.10 0.15 0.20 0.25 0.30
Wall thickness (m)
22
24
26
28
30
32
34
36
38
40
42
44
46
T
e
m
p
e
r
a
t
u
r
e

(

C
)
3:00
6:00
9:00
12:00
15:00
18:00
21:00
24:00
0.00 0.05 0.10 0.15 0.20 0.25 0.30
Wall thickness (m)
22
24
26
28
30
32
34
36
38
40
42
44
46
T
e
m
p
e
r
a
t
u
r
e

(

C
)
3:00
6:00
9:00
12:00
15:00
18:00
21:00
24:00
1 3 5 7 9 11 13 15 17 19 21 23
Time (h)
21
23
25
27
29
31
33
35
37
39
41
43
45
47
T
e
m
p
e
r
a
t
u
r
e

(

C
)
1
2
3
4
5
6
1 3 5 7 9 11 13 15 17 19 21 23
Time (h)
21
23
25
27
29
31
33
35
37
39
41
43
45
47
T
e
m
p
e
r
a
t
u
r
e

(

C
)
1
2
3
4
5
6
1
2 3 4 5
6
Fig. 6. Temperature of the wall I under optimal insulation conditions:
(a) distribution across the wall at various times of the day and (b) time variations
at different interfaces of the wall.
a
b
0.00 0.04 0.08 0.12 0.16 0.20
Insulation Thickness (m)
0
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
Wall I
Wall II
0.00 0.04 0.08 0.12 0.16 0.20
Insulation Thickness (m)
0
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
Wall I
Wall II
0.00 0.04 0.08 0.12 0.16 0.20
Insulation Thickness (m)
0
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
Wall I
Wall II
0.00 0.04 0.08 0.12 0.16 0.20
Insulation Thickness (m)
0
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
Wall I
Wall II
0.00 0.04 0.08 0.12 0.16 0.20
Insulation Thickness (m)
0
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
C
o
s
t

(
T
N
D
/
m
2
)
Wall I
Wall II
C
o
s
t

(
T
N
D
/
m
2
)
T
o
ta
l c
o
s
t
In
s
u
la
tio
n
c
o
s
t
Electricity cost
T
o
t
a
l
c
o
s
t

I
n
s
u
la
t
io
n

c
o
s
t
Electricity cost
Fig. 5. Variations of insulation cost, electricity consumption cost and total cost with
the insulation thickness of: (a) expanded polystyrene and (b) rock wool.
324 N. Daouas et al. / Applied Thermal Engineering 30 (2010) 319326
L
opt

86400DDC
el
PWFk
ins
C
i
COP

R
wt
k
ins
18
For the two methods, cooling transmission load increases as
the base indoor temperature decreases (Fig. 8). However, the de-
gree-days method underestimates the cooling load whose differ-
ence from the present study value increases with the insulation
thickness. Results of the life-cycle cost analysis are illustrated in
Table 3, where the two methods provide values of the same order
of magnitude. For the degree-days method, values of optimum
insulation thickness and payback period are underestimated,
while those of life-cycle savings are overestimated.
5. Conclusion
An exact analytical solution of transient heat transfer through
multilayer walls has been provided using the CFFT technique in
order to analyze the thermal performance of building walls in pres-
ence of periodic outside ambient temperature and solar radiation,
specic to the city of Tunis. A Matlab programwas developed in or-
der to performnumerical calculations based on the analytical mod-
el. This method allowed us to accurately predict hourly variations
of temperature and heat ux density on the inside surface of two
types of uninsulated walls (made of brick or stone) and to compare
their thermal performance in terms of heat storage capability and
effect on indoor comfort.
The CFFT technique was extended to rigorously estimate the
yearly cooling transmission loads. Insulation of external walls
was investigated by considering two wall structures, as typically
used in Tunisian constructions, and two types of insulation mate-
rials (expanded polystyrene and rock wool) placed in the middle.
Results show that east and west orientations, which provide nearly
equal cooling loads, are less favourite compared with south and
north orientations.
An economic model, based on life-cycle cost analysis over a
building lifetime of 30 years, is used in order to determine an opti-
mum insulation thickness which takes into account climatic condi-
tions, wall structure, type and cost of insulation, cost of energy and
other economic parameters. Comparison of optimum insulation
thickness values and resulting energy savings and payback periods
was performed for the different analyzed cases. The most prot-
able case is the sandwich wall made of stone and brick (wall II)
and expanded polystyrene with an optimum insulation thickness
of 5.7 cm. This case provides energy savings of 58% with a payback
period of 3.11 years.
Investigation of the thermal performance of the bricks sand-
wich wall (wall I) under optimal conditions showed that the pres-
ence of insulation signicantly reduced the temperature
uctuations on the inside surface providing a higher level of indoor
comfort. On the other hand, the peak of the heat ux density de-
creased by about 86%.
The results of the present study were compared to those ob-
tained with the degree-days method for different indoor design
temperatures. Economic values provided by the life-cycle cost
analysis present the same variations with indoor design tempera-
ture and are of the same order of magnitude for the two methods.
However, the degree-days method underestimated the cooling
loads and hence the optimuminsulation thickness and the payback
period, and overestimated the energy savings.
The computational procedure proposed in this paper, allows
other investigations with various insulation materials and various
wall structures where different orientations and climatic
0
5
10
15
20
25
June July August September
C
o
o
l
i
n
g

t
r
a
n
s
m
i
s
s
i
o
n

l
o
a
d


(
M
J
/
m
2
)
Expanded polystyrene
Rock wool
Air gap
Without insulation
Fig. 7. Effect of insulation with air gap and other analyzed materials on monthly
cooling transmission loads.
0.00 0.04 0.08 0.12 0.16 0.20
Insulation Thickness (m)
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
C
o
o
l
i
n
g

t
r
a
n
s
m
i
s
s
i
o
n

l
o
a
d

(
k
W
h
/
m
2
)
Present study
Degree-days method
T
i
=

1
8

C
T
i
=

2
2

C
T
i
=

2
6

C
Fig. 8. Effect of design indoor temperature on cooling transmission loads.
Comparison between the present study and the degree-days method.
Table 3
Comparison between the degree-days method and the present study for different values of the indoor design temperature.
T
i
(C) DD (C days) Optimum insulation thickness (m) Life-cycle savings (%) Payback period (years)
DD method Present study DD method Present study DD method Present study
18 925 0.100 0.110 77.52 72.23 1.48 1.88
20 697 0.085 0.097 74.35 69.38 1.72 2.11
22 492 0.069 0.082 69.90 65.39 2.07 2.45
24 323 0.053 0.065 63.63 59.70 2.61 2.96
26 196 0.038 0.047 54.80 51.53 3.46 3.82
N. Daouas et al. / Applied Thermal Engineering 30 (2010) 319326 325
conditions can be considered. A future study dealing with the opti-
mum location of the insulation layer should be carried out.
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