Summary
By transmitting radiation, glass façades can contribute to significantly reducing heating costs in the winter months. However, this requires good insulating properties. In the summer months, this effect can lead to overheating, making it necessary to cool the interior space. Thus, a construction both with and without glass façades require energy-intensive measures (heating / cooling).
One method of overcoming the impediments to large-scale use of glass as an energy efficient façade material is to develop optically active layers, which enable the radiation and heat flows to be intelligently regulated.
Active layers previously researched were unable to establish themselves as marketable products because of specific deficiencies, even though demand is high. Every year, 25 million m2 of insulated glass is installed in Germany alone. The development of gas-chromatic layers is opening up new prospects. Feeding H2 into the cavity between the panes shades a tungsten oxide layer. You can still see through but transmission is considerably reduced. Overflowing the active layer with O2 achromatises the glass.
Boetker was aiming to develop façade systems tailored to the use of this switchable glass and to integrate all the system components necessary to operate this glazing into an aesthetic and easy to install model.
A key prerequisite was the design of an acid and temperature resistant pipe system, which allows the H2 required for switching to be transported invisibly from outside and cleanly, and integrates the gas generator with short pipe lengths.
Result:
The façade panel system developed was used on a test façade and proved easy to handle and to have a high level of functionality. The gas generation unit used ran without faults for the duration of the tests.
