Integration of passive systems to improve the environmental comfort in historic buildings: the natural ventilation. Definition of operational and design models

In the process of protecting and preserving the architectural heritage, the research of balance between structure and form, old and new intervention is an ongoing challenge which aims to respond to modern needs, understanding that it is no longer possible to disregard the understanding of the environmental comfort problems applied to improve the efficiency and compatibility of the intervention. Well-founded in theory the need to intervene on heritage with measures to ‘improve’, the problem that persists in practice consists in calibrate the proper ‘weight’ of concurrent factors: architectural heritage, functional equipment to ensure, assessment of feasibility of the intervention. Therefore, the research will investigate the issues of improvement of the comfort conditions in historical buildings inside the discipline of restoration, especially in its design lapel, where G.C. Argan (1986) has highlighted a disconnection problem between theory and practice. The target is to understand the application of passive systems for reducing the use of active ones, source and cause of problems of compatibility and reversibility, paying attention to ventilation as a passive form of cooling and heating. Underlined are the fallouts in terms of design, with emphasis on the ‘space limits’, where the triggered mechanisms can determine the variations that are useful to define the right interior comfort. In this context it must be assessed not only an objective component, represented by measurable parameters, from compositional aspects of space or technical installations, but also all that part of sensorial components that, if evaluated properly, it can have a positive effect on energy reduction in the buildings. Focal point of the research is the identification of real cases that can provide the basis for the research of a share methodology. It is essential that the matter be extended to the whole context, addressing the issue of ventilation from the confined space until the urban scale, and vice versa, evaluating the contributions that are the boundary that will influence the dynamics, without losing sight of the entire and not the all.