Micros

Intrinsic Heat...a character of micros that distinguish them from conventional or natural structures occurs at the determining size per person threshold ( about 150 sq. ft per person...or below). Below the Micro Threshold the exothermic quality of the human occupant's body itself (whether waking or sleeping) along with the heat content constantly expelled in breathing becomes a thermodynamic factor in interior temperature and its control.

This is further emphasized as the insulation value of the shell itself approaches or exceeds super insulation values (about r-35 for walls and r- 40 or 50 for ceiling and floors).

There are Intrinsic Heat structures designed and built at the size levels of conventional structures...typically going to double exterior walls with interstitial insulation, often approaching 36 inches in depth. Their energy dependence swings off the exothermic characters of contents...appliances, occupants, etc. This principle becomes operative inevitably and automatically as the Micro Threshold is attained.

In winter heating conditions, this is often unnoticeable, since the heat contributed from occupants is stirred with passive solar gain, interior mass re-radiation and support augmentative heating sources.

In the swing season...this can become quite noticeable when all support heating contribution is shut down, but it still becomes remarkable that despite outside temperatures in the 30's and 40's, interior overnite temperatures will maintain in the 60's and 70's. This is attributable only to intrinsic heat effects and in fact, could well become an overall exterior shell thermal performance test mechanism with simple calculation of body ex-radiation content and an averaging of overnite time and temperatures...giving us a measurable rating for the shell insulation value.

Intrinsic Heat, in the current Micro, becomes the sole needed heat contributor in swing seasons...adding to the passive solar gain, thermal mass storage and orientation/ micro-climate locational changes of the Habitat.

The dilemma of the intrinsic heat contribution is in the cooling season, where it can often override the entrained lowered mass temperature of the isolated interior during the heat of the day.

Symptomatic of this being the case is the consistent experience of walking into the Micro and feeling refreshing cool (from mass/body deradiation effect) and then, after a while of sitting or working there, starting to feel hot again. The feeling is not relative or delusion. There has been heated humidity and direct thermal gain from the body (which operates at near 100 degrees f...and is a 1-200 pound thermal water storage mass...or at least 80% of it is). We are, because of the thermal/ aqueous nature of our physiology, hellacious thermal storage and source systems in ourselves....which becomes a factor as the walls of the emerging Micro get closer. Then we turn around and stoke more fuel 3 times a day to keep up the game. Guess what happens.

The point is most poignant in the hot season cooling design. The technique is to design cooling generation or mass storage sufficient to offset this radiation and timed to be effective at the peak of the heat-day...mid to late afternoon.

Discussions of cooling strategies specifically are dealt with elsewhere in the publications regarding Micro-Habitat Technology.