Steady-State Three - Dimensional Numerical Simulation of Heat Transfer for Thermal Bridges Assessment

This paper presents a study on using the steady-state three-dimensional heat transfer software HEAT3 for evaluating the heat flow of heat transfer through different elements of the building envelope in order to establish the linear thermal transmittance of the linear thermal bridge. The linear thermal transmittance is obtained according to the one-dimensional steady-state heat transfer calculation formula for the plane walls using the heat flow values obtained through the method specified above. The results presented in this paper are part of a wider study on evaluating the heat transfer through building’s envelope elements by evaluating as accurate as possible the thermal bridges effect of the most common building structures. As a case study, it was considered the steady-state heat transfer through an opaque outer wall of a building considering the thermal bridges for the following elements: outer walls intersection, inner and outer wall intersection and outer wall with intermediate floor intersection.