Basic information
In the design of buildings, it is common practice to choose structures and building technical systems based on the conditions to be dimensioned. In this case, the structure or other system is designed in such a way that it meets the set requirements under measurable conditions, in which case it can be concluded that it also meets the requirements under conditions easier than the measurable conditions. The goal of the RAMI project was to determine the climatic conditions and design practices for the heat and moisture behaviour of building envelope structures, summer-time overheating risk and space cooling.
The project utilized the 30-year hourly time series data from 1989-2018 and the 30-year periods surrounding the years 2030, 2050 and 2080 in the greenhouse gas scenarios RCP2.6, RCP4.5 and RCP8.5 for past and future climatic conditions from a previous RASMI project. The climatic input data was supplemented with atmospheric downward longwave radiation as a part of the RAMI project.
In terms of building physics, the project was a continuation of the previous FRAME project, which determined the previous critical test years for the building physical design of envelope structures. The new building physical dimensioning years selected in the RAMI project replace these previous climatological test years determined in the FRAME project. Building physically challenging years that occur approximately once every 10 years have been called dimensioning years in the RAMI project to emphasize their dimensioning nature and to more clearly distinguish the years from the energy calculation test years. An effort has been made to keep the design practices of the building physical operation of structures the same in the main aspects of the FRAME project and the practices presented in the latest guidelines of the Ministry of the Environment and RIL ry. However, additional instructions have been given in the appendices of the final report for dimensioning practices as well as the selection of initial data and the interpretation of results.
The RAMI project also looked at the stress conditions of facades with porous stone surfaces from the perspective of frost stress and corrosion. The results of the section have been used in the selection of new building physical dimensioning years.
The energy calculation test years TRY2012 and the latest TRY2020 have been available in Finland (Meteorological Institute (in Finnish)) for calculating the heating and cooling energy consumption of buildings. However, no dimensioning conditions have been available for dimensioning the summertime temperature and cooling power demand of spaces. In the RAMI project, such design conditions have now been determined and are available for building design.
The background information, implementation and results of the RAMI project are described in more detail in the project’s final report. The project was carried out by the Building Physics research group of Tampere University (project coordinator) and the Renovation and Service Life Engineering of Structures research group, the Energy Efficiency and Systems research group of Aalto University and the Extreme Weather and Climate Change research group of the Finnish Meteorological Institute. The project was implemented as part of the Government’s Healthy Spaces 2028 (in Finnish) program. The project was financed by the Ministry of the Environment.
Links to the project’s result materials can be found here:
- Final report of the RAMI project (in Finnish)
- Moisture design years in Finland
- Summertime room temperature and cooling power demand measurement days (in Finnish)
- Final seminar recording and presentation slides (in Finnish)
The final seminar of the RAMI project was held on Tuesday, May 31, 2022, from 9 am to 12 pm. The seminar was held in Finnish. The program and recording of the remotely organized final seminar, as well as the presentation slides as pdf files, can be found on the Finnish version of this web page via the link above.