A solar prototype in a Mediterranean climate: reflections on project, use, results of the monitoring activities, calculations

The paper reports the appraisal of the solar systems behaviour applied to a building erected in the first eighties in Ancona, a town on the east coast of central Italy. This example is quite convenient, as it includes nine different passive solar systems (cold and warm sunspace; Trombe-wall: simple, lightened, with greenhouse; blade interceptor and floor accumulator; double glazed window with screening louvres; direct gain storage; solar wells) and could be repeated today. This is so because the house was designed to take into account not only energy saving but also summer cooling, which today has proved to play an essential role in a Mediterranean climate. Also, extremely simple building techniques and management systems were used. After 20 years, a balance concerning the use and maintenance of the various systems has been carried out, underlining different problems. We processed the data of the monitoring activities carried out on the prototype in the 5 years following its building. Also, I am able to draw up a report from the users’ point of view covering as many as twenty years, as experimental data is often not enough to consider the occupants’ perception and differences from one flat to the other. We are carrying out new calculations and monitoring activities on the prototype that we consider a laboratory on which experiencing the optimization of the same systems in winter and summer phase, also with new solutions suggested by the currently available technologies