a b s t r a c tEvaluating how much heat is lost through external walls is a key requirement for building energy simulators and is necessary for quality assurance and successful decision making in policy making and building design, construction and refurbishment. Heat loss can be estimated using the temperature differences between the inside and outside air and an estimate of the thermal transmittance (U-value) of the wall. Unfortunately the actual U-value may be different from those values obtained using assumptions about the materials, their properties and the structure of the wall after a cursory visual inspection.In-situ monitoring using thermometers and heat flux plates enables more accurate characterisation of the thermal properties of walls in their context. However, standard practices require that the measurements are carried out in winter over a two-week period to significantly reduce the dynamic effects of the wall's thermal mass from the data.A novel combination of a lumped thermal mass model, together with Bayesian statistical analysis is presented to derive estimates of the U-value and effective thermal mass. The method needs only a few days of measurements, provides an estimate of the effective thermal mass and could potentially be used in summer.

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The call for action to transform the built environment and address the threats of climate change has been clearly made. However, to support the development, implementation and on-going evaluation of energy demand policy, a strong evidence base is needed to identify associations and establish underlying causes behind outcomes and variations in end-use energy demand within the population. A new approach to end-use energy demand research is presented which is founded on the interdisciplinary health sciences research framework of epidemiology, along with the establishment of a research centre. A case is made that through an 'energy epidemiology' approach a strong, population-level, empirically based research foundation can be advanced. Energy epidemiology is a whole-system approach that focuses on empirical research and provides a methodological framework for building physicists, engineers, sociologists and economists to engage in interdisciplinary work. The adaptation of the epidemiological approach to end-use energy demand studies will provide the means to observe and describe the trends and patterns of energy demand, to undertake and contextualize interventional studies, and to establish strong associations between factors that lead to an energy demand-related outcome or event. Such an approach would strengthen the evidence base to inform policy decisions and evaluate past intervention programmes or regulatory actions.Keywords: buildings, built environment, energy demand, epidemiology, evidence base, interdisciplinary, public policy, researchIl a été clairement lancé un appel pour mettre en place des mesures propres à transformer le cadre bâ ti et à faire face aux menaces du changement climatique. Néanmoins, pour soutenir l'élaboration, la mise en oeuvre et l'évaluation en continu de la politique relative à la demande énergétique, il est nécessaire de disposer d'une solide base de données factuelle pour identifier les associations et établir les causes sous-jacentes des résultats et des variations de la demande énergétique des utilisateurs finals au sein de la population. Il est présenté une nouvelle approche pour l'étude de la demande énergétique des utilisateurs finals, qui est fondée sur le cadre interdisciplinaire de l'épidémiologie utilisé pour les recherches dans les sciences de la santé, ainsi que sur l'établissement d'un centre de recherche. Il est fait valoir que, par une approche basée sur une « épidémiologie de l'énergie », il est possible de faire progresser la fondation d'une recherche empirique solide au niveau de la population. L'épidémiologie de l'énergie est une approche systémique globale qui est axée sur la recherche empirique et fournit un cadre méthodologique aux physiciens, ingénieurs, sociologues et économistes du bâ timent afin qu'ils participent à des travaux interdisciplinaires. L'adaptation de l'approche épidémiologique aux études relatives à la demande énergétique des utilisateurs finals donnera les moyens d'observer et de décrire les tendances et les schémas de la demande énergétique,...