Influence of measurement uncertainty on classification of thermal environment in buildings according to European Standard EN 15251

European Standard EN 15 251 in its current version does not provide any guidance on how to handle uncertainty of long term measurements of indoor environmental parameters used for classification of buildings. The objective of the study was to analyse the uncertainty for field measurements of operative temperature and evaluate its effect on categorization of thermal environment according to EN 15251.

A data-set of field measurements of operative temperature four office buildings situated in Denmark, Italy and Spain was used. Data for each building included approx. one year of continuous measurements of operative temperature at two measuring points (south/south-west and north/northeast orientation).

Results of the present study suggest that measurement uncertainty needs to be considered during assessment of thermal environment in existing buildings. When expanded standard uncertainty was taken into account in categorization of thermal environment according to EN 15251, the difference in prevalence of exceeded category limits were up to 17.3%, 8.3% and 2% of occupied hours for category I, II and III respectively.