A new approach for measuring predicted mean vote (PMV) and standard effective temperature (SET

Abstract Comfort index-based control has become the tendency of the development of new HVAC control systems, while an effective sensor for thermal comfort index is indispensable to a successful comfort index-based HVAC control system. Based on detailed discussions on calculating and measuring the equivalent temperature, predicted mean vote (PMV) and standard effective temperature (SET*), a comfort sensor with a new structure is proposed in this paper. The proposed PMV and SET* measurement instrument consists of an equivalent temperature sensor, a relative humidity sensor and a temperature sensor. By utilizing this sensor we can “measure” the PMV and SET* of an imaginary environment, which is extended from that defined in the concept of the equivalent temperature by Madsen (ASHRAE Transactions 1984;90(1):1077–90). Furthermore, we show that the PMV and SET* of the imaginary environment are almost the same as the actual ones. Simulation results have verified that the suggested PMV and SET* sensor can have a good measurement of PMV, while for SET* more research work is needed to improve the accuracy of its measurement. Most importantly, more practical work, including calibration validation and test of its sensitivity to the variation of environment variables in real conditions, need to be performed.