Impacts of climate change on indoor thermal comfort in typical Swedish residential buildings - Assessing risks for human health

Abstract: There is strong evidence that climate change has a direct impact on humans and extreme temperatures have been linked to negative health impacts and increasing mortality. The heat wave of 2018 caused up to 8.2% more deaths compared to the year before in Sweden, with higher impacts in other parts of the world. The fact that people spent almost 90% of their times indoors makes the indoor environment susceptible to increase the effect of human temperature exposure. This master thesis assessed the effects of climate change on the indoor thermal comfort and further analyzed the impacts on human health due to temperature exposure. Projections of typical and extreme future climate conditions until the end of the 21st century were used to simulate the indoor temperatures and heating demand of three different constructions of the same building type; original building, retrofit and new design. The indoor temperatures and heating demand were simulated with IDA ICE using future climate projections for three different locations in Sweden; Malmö, Stockholm and Umeå. The health impact assessment was projected with the use of temperature-related morbidity and mortality calculations, with the variation of two different human age groups. Results showed, that the implementation of energy efficient measures for the retrofit and new designed building reduce the heating demand with up to 62%. Simulations of the three constructions indicated highest number of overheating hours (hours over 26°C) in the original building and thermal comfort assessment showed that elderly (65+) experience on average 10% higher discomfort compared to young adults, if a 24h occupancy is considered. In contrast to the findings of the thermal comfort assessment, projection of the future morbidity and mortality indicated the highest risk for people living in the new designed building, where indoor temperature reach up to 34.4°C, with highest effects on elderly people. Future climate projections indicated that Malmö has the highest susceptibility for increased human health impacts compared to Stockholm and Umeå.