The energy saving performance of heat recovery ventilation system in residential buildings in the summer of hot-summer and cold-winter zone in China

The rapid increase in space cooling and heating demand in recent years in the hot-summer and cold-winter (HSCW) zone in China (the most developed area in China) requires technology to be as efficient as possible, consuming the lowest amount of energy necessary. Heat recovery ventilation (HRV) system can meet this demand by lowering the building energy demand by pre-heating or pre-cooling. However, the climate in HSCW zone is humid and rainy all the year round, which may affect the energy performance of HRV system. The current research focuses on field measurements of the performance of HRV system in a test building located in east China to study the actual energy saving performance of the HRV system in the HSCW zone. The actual performance of the HRV system is measured. The experiment reveals that the system can save 14.5% of air-conditioning energy consumption in summer and 4.96% of air-conditioning energy consumption during rainy season. There is no significant energy saving effect in transition seasons. EnergyPlus is used to calculate the energy  performance of the HRV system under different operating conditions. The simulation is compared with the test data. Both the measurements and simulation indicate that the use of HRV system can significantly reduce the energy consumption of the air-conditioned buildings in summer in HSCW zone.