Sistemi di building automation nelle valutazioni LCA sulle strategie di riqualificazione energetica = Building automation systems in LCA evaluation of energetic refurbishment strategies

The goal of the research is the analysis of the environmental impacts associated with differ-ent strategies for energetic efficiency improvement of the architectural heritage, particularly with regard to the specificities of the buildings with historic-environmental value. In fact, in view of the growing need to ensure the refurbishment and the upgrading of several and diversified building on the territory, the interest of several stakeholders involved is more and more oriented in the research of solutions that combine the improvement of performance with the reduction of the environmental impacts and costs. In this scenario, Building Automation (BA) systems can provide an effective tool for the con-trol of existing components and plants, ensuring at the same time: the respect for the histori-cal and environmental value of the building, reversibility and flexibility against the dyna-mism of users’ needs. These aspects, together with the diffusion of miniaturized, low cost and user friendly technologies, are causing the increasingly widespread of the application of these automation systems, and hence the interest in evaluating their potentialities and critical is-sues, especially in comparison with more conventional efficiency improvement systems. For this purpose, energy simulations have been conducted on a building, site in the center of Molfetta (Ba) in order to compare the contribution - in terms of reduction of consumption for heating needs – due to the improvement of envelope’s performances with that achievable through the use of automation systems, as required in EN 15232:2012. This analysis was also articulated in relation to intermediate solutions, which provide a com-bination of BA systems with building interventions on the envelope, optimizing the contribu-tions in relation to Life Cycle Assessment evaluations' results, in order to assess the overall sustainability level of the intervention. Such combinations may be subject to further investi-gation, economic or other ones, that aim to identify broadest feasibility degrees.