## 3 Simulation Results and Discussion
### Comparison of Five Representative Cities  
Figure 7 shows the performance observed for the three parameters studied in greater detail in five representative cities: La Paz, with the mildest winter; Madrid, with a moderate winter; New York, with an average winter; Moscow, with a severe winter; and Yakutsk, often deemed the coldest city in the world [43,44], with the most severe winter. The figure shows for each city the mean, maximum, and minimum values for each dwelling obtained from the simulation of all 60 wood floors as well as the value found for the granite floor. In each graph, the dwellings are arranged on the \(x\)-axis by the mean value for the wood  
Figure 5: Mean values of comfort hours in each city. Figure 6: Mean start-up lag times in each city. floors. As a rule, interior-located, highly-insulated dwellings are positioned on the left, and corner-located, poorly insulated dwellings on the right, although the dwelling-by-dwelling arrangement varies slightly from one graph to another. Figure 7: Energy demand, thermal comfort, and start-up lag time in the 216 dwellings in each of the five selected representative cities. The demand graphs for La Paz, Madrid, and New York show that the four values (mean, maximum, and minimum for wooden floors and the granite floor) overlapped in nearly all dwellings. A very detailed and careful observation reveals that the granite floor exhibited slightly lower demand than the mean for the wooden floors, whilst in many dwellings the minimum demand for the wooden floors was slightly lower than that for the granite. In all three cities, the slightly greater differences were found between the wood and granite floors in the dwellings where demand was highest, although, likewise, those differences were small. This is an indication that the properties of the flooring, whether wood or granite, are of minor importance from the demand standpoint in those cities. In Moscow and Yakutsk, the demand graphs revealed behaviour similar to that described for the other three cities when heating demand was low, but at values of over approximately 35 kWh/m\({}^{2}\) or 40 kWh/m\({}^{2}\), the data points on the curves for minimum demand for wood floors were perceptibly lower than on the curves for maximum and mean demand. At a heating demand of around 35 kWh/m\({}^{2}\) in Moscow and around 55 kWh/m\({}^{2}\) in Yakutsk, the demand curves rose sharply, a finding not observed in the other three cities. That change in slope is explained by the data in Figure 8, where the heating demand and UA-value of the outer enclosure of the dwellings are plotted against dwelling construction in Moscow. In the part of the figure where demand increased sharply, a sudden rise was also observed in the UA-value of the outer enclosures. This was attributable to the change in the glazing percentage, increasing from 15% or 30% to 80%, which would induce the steep rise observed. In cold and extremely cold climates, the substantial heat losses through outer enclosures due to a sharp rise in the UA-value would significantly increase heating demand. The present authors also observed that in dwellings with a high outer UA-value, under the conditioning control strategy defined here, the system came on at the end of the day for just 1 h or less before shutting down until the next day, a practice that contributed to a higher heating demand. Despite the sharp increase in the outer UA-value, a more suitable control strategy could have lowered heating demand considerably. That attests to the importance of implementing suitable strategies, particularly in poorly insulated dwellings with substantial heat losses. In warmer and milder climates, in contrast, increasing outer UA-values and the concomitant increased heat outflow associated with a higher percentage of glazing would be offset by the solar gains induced and explain the absence of any steep increase in heating demand. In Yakutsk, at a demand of approximately 60 kWh/m\({}^{2}\), the curves separated, with the highest demand exhibited by the granite floors.