5. Project understanding and location

The New Cairo Business Hub (GREENEDGE) is located at plot 84, First sector, New Cairo City Center, that is directly overlooking the southern 90 road right beside BNP Paribas Headquarters (Figure 4). The building is designed to be a class (A) office building with total plot area of 33,000 m2 of office spaces for banks and multinational companies at one of the most developed business districts in Egypt with all required amenities and facilities at place and surrounded by Egypt's biggest banks, headquarters, as well as notable multinationals.

data file generated by the USDOE was used in this report. On analyzing the hourly climatic data using Weather Tool, Cairo climate is classified as an arid climate where precipitation rarely occurs. Cairo has a hot desert climate (Köppen climate classification: BWh). The climate is generally dry. The temperatures are hot or very hot in summer days and warm or mild in winter days, but warm in summer nights and cool in winter nights. The temperature varies greatly, especially in summer; it ranges from 7°C at night to 40°C during the day. While the winter temperature does not fluctuate as wildly, it can be as low as 0°C at night and as high as 18°C during the day. Cairo receives less than 25 mm of precipitation annually in most areas and almost never rains in summer. Air temperatures are being outside the comfort zone most of the year. Only during 4 months (March, April, September, and October), a good percentage of the total hours is found to be located in the comfort zone. The prevailing wind is coming from the north to northwest most of the year with average air temperature, while hot wind comes from the west-south direction during specific times of the year. Prevailing wind are coming from the north to northwest most of the year with average air temperature, while hot wind comes from the west-south direction during specific times of the year. Rainfall is rare in

Green Building Rating Systems as Sustainability Assessment Tools: Case Study Analysis

Passive solar heating, thermal mass effect, night purge ventilation, natural ventilation, direct evaporative cooling, and indirect evaporative cooling to enhance the environmental performance of the GREENEDGE in Cairo were tested using Weather Tool. The analysis revealed that while thermal mass and night purge ventilation can enhance the thermal performance during the whole year, almost only natural ventilation can enhance significantly the environmental performance of the building during the summer season. While indirect evaporative cooling can enhance the thermal performance slightly during the summer time, passive solar heating can also contribute to the thermal enhancement during winter time. Using Mahoney table, it revealed that it is essential to deal with such climate to use the following strategies:

• Construction heavy for strong thermal inertia for walls and roofs; jet lag more

In this section, the original design of GREENEDGE building (Figure 5) will be

The GREENEDGE building in its base case was exposed to high incident solar radiation especially on its west and south facades that receive solar radiation every single day of the year with no any internal open spaces such as courtyards. This would affect negatively the building performance. Shaded open spaces are very preferable in the hot dry zones. They can reduce the daytime air and radiant temperatures inside the occupied space. The courtyard helps in maintaining cooled indoor temperatures. It provides a private internal open space that is visually and

explained, highlighting the problems, constrains, and potentials.

Cairo and does not exceed 25 mm/the whole year.

DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.87135

• Compact plans with interior courtyards

• Small, 15 to 25% of the surface of the walls

• Openings in the north and south walls

than 8 hours

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7. Results and discussion

7.1 Existing design analysis

• Dual-targeting buildings that allow air circulation intermittent
