Heat transfer in Rockwool modelling and method of measurement. Modelling radiative heat transfer in fibrous materials

摘要

Fibrous materials are some of the most widely used materials for thermal insulation. In this project the focus of interest has been on fibrous materials for building application. Interest in improving the thermal properties of insulation materials is increasing as legislation is being tightened to reduce the overall energy consumption. A knowledge of the individual heat transfer mechanisms - whereby heat is transferred within a particular material is an essential tool to improve continuously the thermal properties of the material. Heat is transferred in fibrous materials by four different transfer mechanisms: conduction through air, conduction through fibres, thermal radiation and convection. In a particular temperature range the conduction through air can be regarded as a constant, and conduction through fibres is an insignificant part of the total heat transfer. Radiation, however, constitutes 25-40% of the total heat transfer in light fibrous materials. In Denmark and a number of other countries convection in fibrous materials is considered as non-existent when calculating heat transmission as well as when designing building structures. Two heat transfer mechanisms have been the focus of the current project: radiation heat transfer and convection. The radiation analysis serves to develop a model that can be used in further work to gain a wider knowledge of the way in which the morphology of the fibrous material, i.e. fibre diameter distribution, fibre orientation distribution etc., influences the radiation heat transfer under different conditions. The convection investigation serves to examine whether considering convection as non-existent is a fair assumption to use in present and future building structures. The assumption applied in practically is that convection makes a notable difference only in very thick insulation, at external temperatures below -20 deg. C, and at very low densities. For lager thickness dimensions the resulting heat transfer through the fibrous material will be relatively small, which means that a relatively small increase in heat loss by convection may counterbalance part of the savings achieved by increasing the thickness. (au) 39 refs.