7.2.4 Heavy construction for strong thermal inertia for walls and roofs: Time lag more than 8 hours

In the hot dry climate, high heat resistance and high heat capacity of the envelope elements are necessary. High resistance minimizes the conductive heat flow into the building mass during the daytime. Actually, this would reduce the rate of cooling the building mass during nighttime, but it could be overcome by employing

Figure 7. Required opening between the courtyard and the backyard (done by the author after Autodesk Ecotect).

acoustically separated from the outside environment. The base case material for all the windows was single glazed that is not appropriate for such climate particularly

To deal with the current situation, several traditional and contemporary ideas have been adopted. The recommended ideas and solution could be classified under the recommended passive strategies that were raised from the climatic analysis

Maximizing the amount of vegetation inside and outside buildings affects positively the thermal performance of buildings. This could result in shading of the external surfaces of the building, shading the opened spaces, reducing and filtering the dust in the air, and elevating the humidity level [70]. However, vegetation in such climatic conditions could be expensive because of the limitation in the water supply for irrigation and by turn could be against the green architecture principles (Figure 6). Specific types of trees and irrigation technology should be selected to

for the west-south facades and high intensity of solar radiation.

The simulated GREENEDGE building as it is, done by the author after Autodesk Ecotect.

using Weather Tool and Mahoney tables. This could be listed below.

Vegetation around the building (done by the author after Autodesk Ecotect).

7.2 Sustainable design enhancements

Sustainability Assessment at the 21st Century

Figure 5.

7.2.1 Vegetation around the building

best suit the climatic context.

Figure 6.

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night purge ventilation strategy and new techniques of sunscreen which allow air movement [70, 75]. High thermal mass has been achieved traditionally by thick walls that are made of heavy materials such as stone, brick, adobe, and mud. To achieve this with the glazing wall, it has been modified to be double-tinted glazing. A U-value of 1.0 W/m2 K has been used for the external facades. A canopy was added to the southern facade in the form of glazed sunscreen. Shading devices have been designed for the west facade to avoid the very hot solar rays of the afternoon. Firstly, a plan of blocking the solar rays of the summer season from 1:00 pm to 5:00 pm was achieved by 2.4 m depth shading device, which would not be accepted by the architectural consultant and the city council regulations. Therefore, the time range has been minimized to be between 1:00 pm and 3:00 pm and combined between the vertical and horizontal shading devices to minimize the depth of the devices to be 1.0 m (Figure 8). The same shading devices have been applied to the east facade for esthetic reasons.

7.2.6 Daylight and lighting views

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

7.3 Simulation results analysis

Figure 11.

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Figure 10.

Direct lines of sight to the exterior (done by the author).

the sill height was changed to be 30 in (75 cm).

than the required level by LEED (83.09% > 75%) (Figure 12).

Regularly occupied spaces to gross floor area (third floor) (done by the author).

To provide the building occupants with a connection to the outdoors, through the introduction of daylight and views into the regularly occupied areas of the building (Figure 10), it has been recommended to achieve a direct line of sight to the outdoor environment via vision glazing between 30 inches (75 cm) and 90 inches (225 cm) (Figure 11) above the finish floor for building occupants in 90% of all regularly occupied areas [73]. The floor area of the typical floor plan has been simulated using Autodesk Ecotect, and the daylight has been calculated on a height of 30 in (75 cm) above the floor. An interval of 5 foot (150 cm) has been employed in the analysis grid in the two directions X and Y. The first results did not satisfy the credit condition with the windows at sill height of 90 cm. Therefore, the height of

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

By calculating the nodes of more than 25 fc (269.1 lux), the calculation showed that 472 out of 568 nodes are more than 25 fc and less than 500 fc. The percentage of area under the acceptable condition of the credit = 472/568 = 83.09% which is more

Using Autodesk Ecotect, the base case and the modified case have been modeled and simulated. The thermal performance of the third floor has been utilized for the
