Uncertainty analysis of thermal conductivity measurements in materials for energy-efficient buildings

Abstract

The accuracy of thermal conductivity measurements is even more requested for materials characterization in energy-efficient buildings field. ENEA-UTTMATF and CertiMaC research group, as national institute and private laboratory respectively, cooperate in development of new measurement and analysis methods applied to buildings materials and their performances. For what concerns this kind of measurements, an Heat Flow-meter Transducer (HFT) is used. In order to give to both customers and other research institutes involved in the same field (e.g. International Comparison or International Round Robin Tests) the most exhaustive evaluation of the tested material thermal conductivity, a complete uncertainty analysis is implemented on the HFT measures. This uncertainty analysis, developed accordingly to the international standards and with the contribution of INRiM Institute, is described in this paper.

Keywords

• energy efficiency
• building materials
• heat flow meter
• calibration
• regression analysis
• uncertainty budget
• thermal conductivity.