ASHRAE Journal - November 2020 - 32
CELEBRATING 125 YEARS
ASHRAE's History
With Thermal Comfort
BJARNE W. OLESEN, PH.D., PRESIDENTIAL MEMBER/FELLOW/LIFE MEMBER ASHRAE
The thermal environment is one of the most important factors of the living and working environment, and thermal comfort is an important parameter for the well-being
of humans. Very early it was clear that several environmental parameters would
influence people's thermal comfort, such as surrounding temperature, air velocity, humidity, clothing and physical activity. How to predict the thermophysiological
response that affects thermal sensation and, consequently, well-being and productivity has been an especially key issue regarding thermal comfort. This historical
overview focuses on the 20th century until the beginning of the 1990s. A paper by
de Dear, et. al.,1 covers more recent research and knowledge on thermal comfort.
ASHRAE Pioneers of Thermal Comfort
The progress of any scientific area is very much dependent on some individual pioneers who compete but
also, together, develop knowledge. During the 20th century, four of the main contributors to studies of thermal
comfort were Pharo Gagge, Fred Rohles, Ralph Nevins
and P. Ole Fanger (Figure 1). They, with their research
groups during the 1970s and 1980s, were the main contributors to the studies on the influence of the thermal
environment on people in buildings.
Thanks to the evolution of knowledge in the field of
physiology, in the first half of the 20th century studies progressed quickly. In 1923 Yaglou, assisted by F.C.
Houghten,2 - 4 formulated the effective temperature (ET)
index based on the thermal sensation felt by a subject in
movement between two conditioned environments. At
the beginning, ET referred only to a homogeneous environment and standard clothing conditions.
In 1924, the John B. Pierce Laboratory was founded
at Yale where under the guidance of C-E.A. Winslow
(the first director), L.P. Herrington and A.Pharo Gagge
began their studies on the energy flows between
humans and his surrounding environment, creating
one of the most famous and prolific schools focusing on
thermophysiology.
In 1941 the John B. Pierce Laboratory's group5 formulated the most-used units for metabolic rate (met) and
clothing insulation (clo). This change was to get away
from using IP or SI units and increase understanding
of thermal physiology (heat stress, cold stress) and the
impact of clothing and activity among World War II's
Allied soldiers.
Bjarne W. Olesen, Ph.D., is the director of the International Centre for Indoor Environment and Energy and a professor in the Department of Civil Engineering at Technical University
of Denmark.
32
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ASHRAE Journal - November 2020
Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of ASHRAE Journal - November 2020
Contents
ASHRAE Journal - November 2020 - Intro
ASHRAE Journal - November 2020 - Cover1
ASHRAE Journal - November 2020 - Cover2
ASHRAE Journal - November 2020 - 1
ASHRAE Journal - November 2020 - Contents
ASHRAE Journal - November 2020 - 3
ASHRAE Journal - November 2020 - 4
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ASHRAE Journal - November 2020 - Cover3
ASHRAE Journal - November 2020 - Cover4
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