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Vertical greening systems (VGS) are considered an effective strategy to enhance the insulation performance of the building envelope. Existing methods predicting the performance of this strategy usually require a combination of mathematical modeling and building performance simulation, hence difficult for practical use. To simplify this work, this study has proposed a prediction method requiring building simulation only, by considering VGS as a shading component in the simulation work. To compare its performance, a model using conventional methods has also been proposed. A further simplification by neglecting the impact of transpiration has been investigated as well. To justify the implementation of the new method, it has been used to optimize the design of VGS for buildings located in the hot summer and cold winter areas in China. The validation result confirmed the accuracies of both methods, with the simpler method giving an insignificant lower accuracy than the conventional method, which can be compensated by its simpler prediction procedure. The implementation justification showed that for buildings in the HSCW area, VGS is suggested to be installed on the west facade, with a leaf area index of 4. This can help to reduce the heat transfer of the wall by 56.6%. • This study proposed and verified two models for vertical greening systems. • The effect of transpiration on the accuracy of predicting VGS performance was analyzed. • A simplified modeling method was presented for evaluating the performance of VGS. • The effects of leaf area index and wall orientation were studied for the HSCW region. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A dynamic mathematical model for simulating the coupled heat and moisture transfer within multilayer wall was proposed. The model was validated by comparing with representative benchmark tests. According to the mould germination conditions, a predictive evaluation method of mould germination risk in building wall was developed, which is based on transient distributions of temperature and relative humidity and their duration. Taking the red brick wall as example, the influence of relative humidity and temperature of indoor air on mould germination risk in wall was analyzed. And corresponding study was carried out for the major cities in Guangdong province. The results show that relative humidity of indoor air mainly influences the mould germination risk in the inner side of the wall. Relative humidity increase results in a rapid increase of the mould germination risk. The temperature of indoor air influences both the inner side and outer side of the wall. Temperature increase leads to increase of the mould germination risk in the inner side, but decrease in the outer side of the wall. Solar radiation has a great effect on mould germination risk, and less solar radiation results in a greater mould germination risk. In order to reduce the mould germination risk, different measure should be taken for different city and for different position in building wall. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]