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Seasonal variation of thermal comfort demands directly affects the energy needs for heating or cooling purpose. In previous studies, the differences of neutral temperatures between summer and winter were revealed, but the studies on the difference of human thermal adaption in transitional seasons are insufficient. To clarify this, this paper presents a year-long survey which was carried out in 505 residential buildings in six cities located in the Hot Summer and Cold Winter (HSCW) zone of China involving 11,524 subjects. Results show a significant difference of adaptive responses in different seasons, and a lag of behavioral responses behind climate change in transitional seasons is observed. Occupants not only adjust clothing insulation according to air temperature in different seasons, but also actively control indoor air movement, including closing/opening windows and using fans. The seasonal, monthly and daily neutral temperatures are studied, implying that occupants’ thermal experience has significant effect on their thermal comfort by behavioral, physiological and psychological paths. According to the comparative study, the running mean air temperature method and aPMV model are recommended in free-running space. The findings provide scientific evidence to the concept that dynamic thermal comfort temperature range should be considered in evaluation of indoor thermal environment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• Building Bio-Climatic Charts are proposed for different climate change scenarios. • Time-varying significance of nine design parameters in this century are provided. • Effectiveness of airtightness will increase up to 329% by the end of this century. • Cooling potentials of natural ventilation will significantly decrease up to 69%. • A holistic passive design can reduce the building annual cooling load by 56.7%. The application of passive design strategies is crucial at the early architectural design stage for building energy use minimization. However, the time-varying effectiveness of passive design strategies in responding to future climate change in hot and humid climates are rather limited in the literature. This paper aims to examine the dynamic effectiveness of passive design strategies for residential buildings in Hong Kong under the context of future climate change. Using the newly developed hourly weather data and adaptive comfort standard model, the dynamic effectiveness of viable passive design strategies for residential buildings are evaluated over time in the 21st century by plotting Givoni building bio-climatic charts (BBCC) and simulation-based sensitivity analyses in a validated EnergyPlus model. Results show that solar protection strategies are still the highly sensitive strategies for building energy performance and the effectiveness of external windows' airtightness is expected to increase up to 329% by the end of this century, whereas the cooling potential of ventilation utilization will significantly decrease over time. When the different combination of sensitive passive design parameters is implemented onto the baseline residential building model for different climate scenarios, the annual and peak cooling load can be reduced up to 56.7% and 64.5%, respectively. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]