Abstract
This paper presents a toolset for the efficient control of the indoor air quality and thermal comfort in retrofitted buildings. The
refurbishment of existing buildings, compliant to actual regulations, often leads to airtightness and the consequent poor
conditions for the occupants that could cause low productivity and even sickness. For this reason, the CETIEB (Cost Effective
Tools for Better Indoor Environment in Retrofitted Energy Efficient Buildings) project developed innovative low-cost solutions
to monitor and control the indoor air quality and thermal comfort. Among the technologies developed, this paper presents ad-hoc
sensors for the monitoring of Total Volatile Organic Components (TVOC), CO2 and thermal comfort together with a control
logic that, using measured data, provides the optimal rules to actuate the control devices (ventilation, heating/cooling, windows
opening, shutters operation and so on). The application and validation of the integrated solution, monitoring plus control logic,
was performed in a laboratory building to compare the performance of the proposed solution with the traditional system
employed in buildings. The results turned out to show sensors performances comparable with commercial solutions but with a
significant reduction of costs. Moreover, the application of the integrated solution showed an improvement of the indoor air
quality and comfort with a 15% of energy saving, compared to the traditional thermostatic control.