Experimental Study on the Thermal Behavior of Exterior Coating Textures of Building in Hot and Arid Climates

• Main Authors: Islam Boukhelkhal, Fatiha Bourbia
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: MDPI AG 2021-04-01
• Series: Sustainability
• Subjects: solar radiation; surface temperature; coating texture; shade; palm particles; thermal comfort
• Online Access: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/13/8/4175

The building envelope is the barrier between the interior and exterior environments. It has many important functions, including protecting the interior space from the climatic variations through its envelope materials and design elements, as well as reduction of energy consumption and improving indoor thermal comfort. Furthermore, exterior building sidings, in addition to their aesthetic appearance, can have useful textures for reducing solar gains and providing good thermal insulation performance. This research examined and evaluated the effect of external siding texture and geometry on energy performance. For this objective, a field in situ testing and investigation of surface temperature was carried out on four samples (test boxes) with different exterior textures and different orientations, under the climate zone of Constantine–Algeria during the summer period. The results indicated significant dependability between the exterior texture geometry, the percentage of shadow projected, and external surface temperature. The second part of the research involved a similar approach, exploring the effect of three types of particles with the same appearance but with different thermal characteristics. It was concluded that the natural plant aggregates “palm particles” had the best performance, which contributed to a significant reduction of external surface temperature reaching 4.3 °C, which meant decreasing the energy consumption.