Architecture Commons^™

Genetic Algorithm Theory In Simulation Programs As A Tool For Improving The Environmental Performance Of Office Buildings, Somaia Mohamed Arafa, Esraa Mohamed Elazab, Nanees Abd Elhamid Elsayyad

Mansoura Engineering Journal

Globally, a large proportion of a building's energy is consumed to achieve thermal comfort, as promoting energy efficiency and environmental sustainability of buildings is an important global goal. Therefore, the new building regulations are geared explicitly toward energy-saving projects. However, there are usually many competitive priorities, such as maximizing energy use in office buildings, leading to the complex multi-objective optimization topic. The main objective of this research was to reduce the energy consumed for cooling load in the office buildings in the city of Cairo, which is located in a hot desert climate. This was achieved by optimizing ten different …

Zero Net Energy Test House, Timothy Hemsath, James D. Goedert, Avery Don Schwer, Yong Cho

Durham School of Architectural Engineering and Construction: Faculty Publications

This paper describes the first phase of a residential research program to reduce the impact of new construction on the environment through research and education using a Zero Net Energy Test House as a framework. Containing four bedrooms, three and a half baths, the 1,800 square foot house, 1,000 square foot basement, is located in Omaha, Nebraska. It is being used to validate several research projects and provides a platform for applications research of a number of technological advances. Laminated photovoltaic solar panels, a wind turbine, and an occupant monitoring energy control system are some of the sustainable design innovations …

From Waste To Energy:   Reuse Of Landfills To Create Eco-Friendly Spaces, Maya Maasarani, Ayman Afify, Hiba Mohsen, Maged Youssef

BAU Journal - Creative Sustainable Development

Waste to Energy (W to E) minimize the amount of waste sent to landfill, which also reduces negative impacts on the environment. This problem has been a common occurrence since the beginning of time. Waste to Energy will assist in the creation of a low-carbon society. Currently, the challenge behind reaching Eco-friendly space is a result of the continuity of incineration and landfill uncontrolled Municipal Solid waste on slopes and seashore. This environmental disaster as worldwide landfill is oversaturated and can collapse at any moment and cause dangerous damage to the environment. The average trash production increased phenomenally worldwide, resulting …

Energy-Saving Occupant Behaviour In Offices: Change Strategies, Mark Mulville, Keith Jones, Gesche Huebner, Joanne Powell-Grieg

Articles

As regulated energy consumption in buildings is reduced, the proportional importance of unregulated energy consumption increases. Reducing unregulated energy use in the commercial office requires an understanding of the factors that influence workplace behaviour. To date these factors have been assumed to be similar to those that influence behaviour in the home. However, the social dynamics of the workplace are different to those in the home. This study examines the degree to which theories of behaviour change generated largely in a domestic building setting could be used as the basis for designing interventions to reduce unregulated energy consumption in the …

Divisible Cities, Noel Brady

Other resources

No abstract provided.

Parity, Hamza Hasan

Architecture Senior Theses

Digital data contributes to an increasingly alienated aspect of our infrastructure. The complex practices of the Internet produce highly specified, engineered objects. Though their forms are ‘optimized,’ their intentions are not: the two primary considerations for the development of the infrastructure of the Internet are energy and security. Each category presents its own deliberations, but both often produce non-architectural, infrastructural elements beyond public visibility. The hidden infrastructure of data storage and mining (the indexing and analysis of data and traffic) produces spaces outside the agency of normative architectural discourse.

The key consideration for the design of the Internet is redundancy, …

Development Of Simulation Modules For Liquid Desiccant Systems In Sorpsim, Zhiyao Yang

Open Access Theses

Liquid Desiccant Systems (LDS) have been an attractive alternative to the conventional vapor-compression air conditioning technology in HVAC applications for their thermally-driven nature and the expertise in dealing with large latent load in a more energy-efficient way. Much effort has been made during the past decades to study the performance of LDS and their components both experimentally and through modelling approach. However, predicting the performance of LDS is still a skill-demanding task because it involves model implementation, retrieval of fluid properties, solving procedure setup, and preparation of a good set of initial guess value to model just one component. It …

Designing And Constructing For A Sustainable Future: Community Urban Housing In Timber: Projects By 4th. Year Architecture Students At Dit, Jim Roche

Conference papers

There is some agreement and much debate among interested parties about what constitutes ‘sustainable housing’. The term ‘sustainable’ is used somewhat liberally to mean different things to different listeners. Governments, institutions, interest groups and individual designers often address certain aspects while ignoring the bigger picture. But the bigger picture is such a multivalent issue that includes aspects outside the architect’s immediate remit such as location, transport, security, procurement policy and post-occupancy analysis and management. Or are these outside the architect’s remit?

Teaching sustainable housing within conventional architecture programmes means educators are restricted to identifying certain key issues that students should …

An Emerging Vocabulary: Architecture Of Performance, Jeremy H. Stock

Kaleidoscope

Re-chartered at the University of Kentucky in 2005, the Triangle Fraternity – a brotherhood of students studying Architecture, Engineering, and Sciences – now seeks to establish a visible presence by building a new fraternity house on-campus. To enable this investigation, professors Gregory Luhan, Peyman Jahed, and Bruce Walcott developed a design + energy studio experience that provided a framework for an integrated design team to use a systems-thinking approach to generate a range of scalable, net-zero energy prototypes. These prototypes can be applied in a variety of contexts and have the potential to address larger issues, such as energy efficiency …

The Potential For Energy Reduction In Uk Commercial Offices Through Effective Management And Behaviour Change, Mark Mulville, Keith Jones, Gesche Huebner

Articles

eneral office equipment can be responsible for a significant proportion of overall electrical energy consumption in UK offices and this is predicted to rise significantly over the coming years [Webber, C. A., Roberson, J. A., Brown, R. E., Payne, C. T., Nordman, B., & Koomey, J. G. (2001). Field surveys of office equipment operating patterns. Berkley: CA: Lawrence Berkley National Laboratory]. As a significant contributor to overall energy use, this equipment has a corresponding cost and carbon impact. The legally binding requirements of the climate change act [Department of Energy and Climate Change. (2008 Department of Energy and …

A Case Study Of Zero Energy Home Built For Solar Decathlon Competition 2013, Sanjib Mulepati

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Energy consumption in residential homes has been a subject of research related to sustainability. Reduction in the consumption of energy is a goal of sustainable construction. The Department of Energy (DOE) started a Solar Decathlon competition in 2002 in which the students from different universities around the globe build an energy efficient and affordable home suitable for their climate and location. The main goal of this competition is to select the best home that is designed and built in a sustainable way. In this study, the home designed and constructed for participation in the competition by the students at University …

Environmental Monitoring In Preparation For The Installation Of A Green Roof, Andrew N. Martin, Ming Qu

The Summer Undergraduate Research Fellowship (SURF) Symposium

Green roofs are becoming an increasingly popular way to improve the environmental, economic, and aesthetic performance of both new and existing buildings. Along with the green roofs themselves, it is also common to install sensors to measure various environmental parameters that are affected by or important to the operation of the roof such as precipitation, temperature, and runoff. However, for most of these systems, the sensors are installed at the same time or even after the green roof. Therefore, no before-and-after comparisons can be made for those roofs. To account for this missing data, monitoring equipment was installed on a …

Technology Portal For Energy Efficient Buildings, Larry D. Hermanson, Daniel Studer, Annie Mroz

STAR Program Research Presentations

Project: Technology Portal for Energy Efficient Buildings

Date: August 2, 2012

Author: Larry Hermanson

Mentor: Daniel Studer

Cohort: Annie Mroz

Lab site: National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL)

Buildings account for 71% of the electricity demand and 39% of the primary energy consumption in the United States. The Commercial Buildings Group at NREL provides builders, designers and building owners accurate information to significantly improve the energy efficiency of new and existing buildings. The Technology Portal for Energy Efficient Buildings will increase the accessibility of standardized and credible energy performance data for all building systems, thereby allowing building owners to better evaluate …

Assessing The Engineering Performance Of Affordable Net-Zero Energy Housing, Jordan P. Wallpe

Purdue Polytechnic Masters Theses

The purpose of this research was to evaluate affordable technologies that are capable of providing attractive, cost-effective energy savings to the housing industry. The research did so by investigating the 2011 Solar Decathlon competition, with additional insight from the Purdue INhome. Insight from the Purdue INhome verified the importance of using a three step design process to design a net-zero energy building. In addition, energy consumption values of the INhome were used to compare and contrast different systems used in other houses.

Evaluation of unbiased competition contests gave a better understanding of how a house can realistically reach net-zero. Upon …

Following Industry's Leed : Municipal Adoption Of Private Green Building Standards, Sarah B. Schindler

Faculty Publications

Local governments are beginning to require new, privately constructed and funded buildings to be “green” buildings. Instead of creating their own, locally-derived definitions of green buildings, many municipalities are adopting an existing private standard created by members of the building industry: LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design). This Article explains and assesses the privately promulgated LEED standards. It argues that the translation of LEED standards, which were intended to be voluntary, into law raises several theoretical and practical problems. Specifically, private green building ordinances that rely on LEED do not ensure a reduction in the negative local environmental impacts …