4818 - Thermal Performance Benefits of Precast Concrete Panel and Integrated Concrete Form Technologies for Residential Construction PDF

The Equivalent Wall Method is applied to compare the thermal performance of concrete construction technologies against standard wood frame systems. The Equivalent Wall Method provides a technique to incorporate the multi-dimensional heat conduction steady-state and transient characteristics of an entire wall assembly, including the clear wall and wall detail regions, into a whole building energy simulation program. Several different types of precast concrete panel (PCP), insulated concrete form (ICF), and wood frame constructions were analyzed using this method. Whole building dynamic modeling was employed to calculate the energy savings of a typical single-family residence constructed with PCP and ICF systems compared to wood frame systems for six different US climates. Some configurations of concrete systems are shown to offer an improvement in performance over the wood frame systems, but the amount of improvement depends on, in decreasing order of significance, airtightness, insulation continuity, and magnitude and location of thermal capacitance.