Human Thermal Comfort Modeling

From a perspective of maximizing thermal comfort for occupants while minimizing energy consumption, personalized air conditioning systems (PCS) have gained attention as a more cost-effective alternative to conventional air conditioning systems that maintain a constant temperature in a room. To implement or introduce such novel technologies, it is necessary to quantify user’s perception of them. While experiments involving human subjects and the use of a thermal manikin can be used to evaluate thermal comfort, they are not always practical. With the advancement of computational technology, more sophisticated physiological and psychometric models that go beyond traditional comfort indices have been proposed to evaluate thermal comfort in complex environments such as those with non-uniform and transient temperatures. This chapter describes the history and several examples of thermoregulation and thermal comfort models and introduces the concept of ‘thermal alliesthesia’ which refers to subjective experiences of thermal pleasure resulting from changes in a person's thermal status.