Course Description

This course opens with a wall that can't make up its mind. Take one wall — same build-up, same materials, same thickness — and put it in a mild place. It passes. Put the exact same wall somewhere harsh, and it does not. The wall hasn't changed at all. What changed is everything around it.

A verdict on a wall is never a property of the wall alone — it's the wall plus its surroundings. This course is about describing those surroundings honestly and precisely: the climate outside, and the boundary conditions that turn that climate into a rule at each face of the wall.

You will learn to distinguish climate — a long-run statistical picture of a place — from the weather on any single day, and to set a boundary condition correctly: the temperature, the humidity, and the surface resistance at each face of a wall, including why a wall, a roof, and a floor each need their own values.

The course shows why a heat-loss calculation and a condensation calculation deliberately use different conditions on the very same wall — a steady picture with two temperatures and no humidity for heat loss, against a full year of months, humidity on both sides, and a more cautious cold surface for condensation — and why that difference can produce two genuinely different verdicts.

It also shows where boundary conditions really attach on a real façade system, including the special case of a ventilated rainscreen cavity, where the outside boundary moves inward to the back of the cavity — and gathers every standard behind these conditions into a single, named registry so nothing is chosen from habit.

Presented by Eugene Korch (façade engineer and IAST Programme Director, this course closes the groundwork of the series — physics, systems, materials, and now conditions — and hands you everything a real calculation needs, just before the course changes gear into full heat-loss analysis.

Included in Facade Intelligence Professional Membership (FI PRO)

Learning Outcomes

By the end of this course, you will be able to:

  • Explain why the same wall can pass in one location and fail in another without any change to the wall itself, and why boundary conditions are a deliberate engineering choice, not a software default

  • Distinguish climate — a long-run statistical picture of a place — from the weather on any single day, and explain why climate, not weather, is what a calculation needs

  • Identify the components of a climate dataset relevant to façade calculations — temperature, humidity, solar radiation, and wind — and pair each with the check it drives

  • Explain why choosing a regional climate dataset for a site without its own data is an assumption, and recognise the site conditions that call for extra caution

  • Define a boundary condition as the rule set at each face of a wall — its temperature, humidity, and surface resistance — and distinguish it from the general climate of a region

  • Explain what a surface resistance physically represents, and why it differs between a still indoor face and a windier outdoor one

  • Explain why a wall, a roof, and a floor each need their own surface resistance values, based on the direction heat travels relative to each surface

  • Set the boundary conditions for a steady-state heat-loss calculation: two fixed design temperatures, standard surface resistances, and no humidity — and explain why humidity is deliberately left out

  • Set the boundary conditions for a monthly condensation calculation: a full year of climate data, humidity on both sides described by an indoor humidity class, and a more cautious internal surface resistance

  • Explain why the condensation check uses a more cautious surface resistance than the heat-loss check, and what that convention is protecting against

What's Covered

Part 1 — A Calculation Needs Conditions on Each Side, and What Climate Really Means

The same wall, in a mild place and a harsh one — and why the verdict belongs to the wall plus its surroundings, not the wall alone.
Why input data means describing two worlds — inside and outside — and why the two checks get different conditions on purpose.
Climate as statistics, not weather: a stable, long-run picture of a place, not any single day.
What a climate dataset actually describes — temperature, humidity, solar radiation, and wind — and which of those drive which check.
Why choosing a regional dataset for an unmeasured site is an honest assumption, and when to look harder before trusting it.

Part 2 — From Climate to Boundary Conditions

What a boundary condition actually is: the rule set at each face of the wall — temperature, humidity, and how readily that surface trades heat.
Surface resistance: the thin film of air at every surface, different indoors and outdoors, and why it is a real physical effect, not an abstract fudge factor.
Why boundary conditions are chosen, not given — and the trap of accepting whatever a programme loads by default.
The standards registry behind every condition this lecture uses, gathered in one place.

Part 3 — Boundary Conditions for Heat Loss

The steady picture: two fixed design temperatures, and why humidity is deliberately left out of a heat-loss calculation.
Standard surface resistance values for the heat-loss check, and why they are not reinvented project by project.
Why a wall, a roof, and a floor each take their own surface resistance, based on the direction heat travels.

Part 4 — Boundary Conditions for Condensation, and Why They Differ

Why condensation needs a whole year, month by month, rather than one steady snapshot.
Humidity on both sides, and the indoor humidity class that describes how a building is actually used.
Why the condensation check deliberately uses a more cautious, colder internal surface resistance than the heat-loss check.
One wall, two boundary sets, two different verdicts — the idea the whole lecture is built on.
Where the true inside and outside boundaries of a real wall actually sit, and the special case of a ventilated rainscreen cavity.

Part 5 — One Real Wall, Both Checks, and Where the Course Goes

A full worked example: one real wall, checked for heat loss and for condensation, using two different sets of boundary conditions.
The one idea to carry forward: the conditions are not background, they are the question you are asking.
Why this closes the groundwork of the course, and what changing gear into full calculations means next.

Your Instructor

Programme Director, IAST Eugene Korch

Eugene is a façade engineer and educator with extensive experience in building envelope design and technical specification. Through the Institute for Architectural Science and Technology (IAST) and Facade Intelligence, he delivers CPD training to architects and construction professionals across the UK. His teaching approach emphasizes practical application and accessibility, making complex technical subjects understandable for design professionals.

Course Schedule

    1. Course Overview

    2. Course Objectives

    3. How to Navigate the Learning Materials

    1. Introduction Video

    1. Lecture

    2. Post-Lecture Reading List

    1. Certificate: Download & Share

About this course

  • £120.00
  • Practice test questions
  • CPD Certificate: 2 hrs

Who Should Enrol

This course is designed for:

Anyone setting up or reviewing a heat-loss or condensation calculation.
Architects and Architectural Technologists who need to understand why a wall’s verdict depends on its surroundings.
Junior Façade Engineers building a disciplined approach to calculation inputs.
Envelope Designers and Façade Specialist Contractors.
Building Envelope Consultants.
Project Managers and Design Managers working across multiple regions and climates.

Course Details

Format: Self-paced online course with video lectures
Duration: Approximately 30 minutes
CPD Points: 2 hours structured CPD / 2 Learning Units
Access: 12 months from enrolment
Certificate: CPD certificate issued upon completion
Prerequisites: Recommended — our fundamentals courses on energy and moisture, glazing, façade systems, and materials (helpful context, not required)

What Makes This Course Different

Built around one unsettling demonstration: the exact same wall, passing in one place and failing in another, with nothing about the wall itself changed.
A clear distinction that resolves a common confusion: climate as statistics versus weather as a single day.
Shows the same wall taken through two genuinely different sets of boundary conditions: producing two different verdicts, side by side.
Covers the real-world placement of boundaries: including the ventilated rainscreen cavity that catches even experienced engineers out.
A complete, named standards registry: every condition traced back to ISO 6946, ISO 13788, CIBSE Guide A, and the paired method-and-compliance codes for Europe, the USA, and Australia.

Joining options

  • £120.00

    Free for Facade Intelligence Professional Members (FI PRO)

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