Analysis of climatic conditions and preliminary assessment of alternative cooling strategies for houses in California transition climate zones

摘要

This preliminary scoping study was done as part of the 'Alternatives to Compressive Cooling in California Transition Climates' project, which has the goal of demonstrating that houses in the transitional areas between the coast and the Central Valley of California do not require air-conditioning if they are properly designed and operated. The first part of this report analyzes the climate conditions within the transitional areas, with emphasis on design rather than seasonal conditions. The second part of the report is a preliminary assessment using DOE-2 computer simulations of the effectiveness of alternative cooling and control strategies in improving indoor comfort conditions in two conventional Title-24 houses modeled in various transition climate locations. The results indicate the cooling strategies all have limited effectiveness, and need to be combined to produce significant improvements in indoor comfort.