Indoor thermal environment in a rural dwelling heated by air-source heat pump air-conditioner

Air-source heat pumps (ASHP) are increasingly used to improve space heating. However, few relevant studies have focused on the rural residential buildings that use ASHP air-conditioners for heating conditions. Therefore, this paper presents experiments and numerical simulations to analyse the impact of ASHP air-conditioners on the indoor thermal environment of a rural dwelling during heating seasons. In this study, the influences of different air-supply parameters (temperature, angle and velocity of air supply) and the position of the ASHP air-conditioner on the local thermal comfort were evaluated. The influence weights of both the above factors and their interaction were obtained. The simulation results showed that the temperature differences between the head and foot region (ΔT_h-f) in most cases exceeded 3.0℃, demonstrating the thermal comfort in the rural dwelling was more unacceptable than the urban buildings. Moreover, the results of orthogonal design indicated that air-supply velocity had the most significant impact on the ΔT_h-f values, followed by the air-supply temperature, air-supply angle and installation height. Reducing any air-supply parameter or enhancing the installation height might improve the thermal comfort performance. This research can provide practical strategies for improving the indoor thermal environment of rural dwellings, and guide the design of ASHP air-conditioning systems.