Impact of including hemp concrete hysteresis on its hygrothermal behavior modelling at wall and room scales

Hemp concrete is a bio-composite material known by its ability to regulate external temperature and relative humidity variations making it an interesting insulator. Several researches conducted on wall scale show that including hysteresis phenomenon could improve hemp concrete hygrothermal behavior prediction in the modelling. On the contrary, others prove that reliable results could be obtained using average sorption curve instead. Moreover, the study of this impact on room scale is very scarce. This work aims to evaluate the impact of including the hysteresis occurring between hemp concrete sorption curves in the modelling at two different scales. At wall scale, the hygrothermal behavior of hemp concrete walls subjected to real weather conditions is studied. At room scale, the study focuses on the room indoor conditions and energy consumption with or without using hysteresis. Preliminary results show a high impact of hysteresis on temperature and relative humidity evolutions within the wall. Although, this impact is less perceived at room scale.