Smart Living Lunch

In this Smart Living Lunch titled "Living in Extremes: Dynamic Thermal Environment in Traditional Nomadic Yurts", Prof. Dolaana Khovalyg (EPFL, TEBEL) will present the relationship between physical parameters and daily activities of a nomadic pastoralist along with the discussion on resiliency of people to thermal exposure. Follow the online presentation on 9 December 2020 from 11:00 to 12:00. Zoom link upon registration.

In modern society, we spent more than 90% of our time indoors, and our buildings are responsible for 40% of the energy use and 36% of CO2 emissions, at least in the EU. Almost 50% of energy in buildings goes to indoor space thermal conditioning to maintain the uniform indoor temperature in compliance with the indoor environmental standards. Thus, the indoor climate is typically tightly controlled and, typically, cold, and heat exposures are usually avoided in buildings, and the design of the indoor environment aims towards achieving thermoneutrality of occupants. However, current global climate change urges the built environment to cope with extreme outdoor conditions.

Looking for inspiration for designing the sustainable and healthy built environment in modern societies in times of climate change, we studied the lifestyle of Asian nomads in the south of Siberia, traditionally living in semi-natural conditions in yurts and daily exposed to temperature extremes. Temporal variation of indoor microclimate, outdoor conditions, and thermo-physical characteristics of the selected yurts was monitored for three days in January 2020.

Measurements reveal a significant temporal and spatial variation of the indoor thermal environment. Remarkably, pastoralists go in and out of the yurt many times during a day and are thereby exposed to frequent temperature variations of up to 50 K.

The smart living lunches take place once a month from 11:00 to 12:00 in Fribourg to present the research activities of the Smart Living Lab.