Addressing Sustainable Building Design: Combining Energy and Structural Optimization

A special issue of Buildings (ISSN 2075-5309). This special issue belongs to the section "Architectural Design, Urban Science, and Real Estate".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (15 September 2022) | Viewed by 6789

Special Issue Editors


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Guest Editor
Department of Engineering, Università degli Studi del Sannio, Piazza Roma 21, 82100 Benevento, Italy
Interests: thermodynamics; modeling of energy systems; energy optimization; energy efficiency; building performance simulation; building optimization; energy retrofit; sustainable design; cost-optimal analysis; energy policies
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Guest Editor
Università degli Studi di Napoli Federico II, Department of Structures for Engineering and Architecture, Via Claudio 21, 80125 Napoli, Italy
Interests: digital fabrication; 3D concrete printing; composite materials; fiber reinforced concrete; finite element modeling; sustainability and sustainable materials (including recycling and life cycle assessment); innovative materials and techniques for seismic retrofit; structural behaviour
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

It is well-known that most existing buildings were constructed without any seismic provisions, in an era in which energy efficiency and environmental sustainability requirements were not a critical part of the design. Consequently, over the last few decades, innovative retrofit techniques for existing buildings as well as the design of new high-performance building components and systems have progressively attracted the interest of the scientific community and government institutions. Their effective implementation requires a proper and optimized building design, which is fundamental to promoting a sustainable and safe built environment for future generations. In addition, new technologies enabled by Industry 4.0 (e.g., additive manufacturing) as well as advanced mathematical approaches (e.g., topology optimization) have the potential to provide efficient solutions for the design of building envelope components with enhanced thermal and structural behavior and, at the same time, characterized by a sustainable use of resources.

Within this frame, this Special Issue proposes a journey through different methodological approaches to address building design optimization combining multiple aspects (i.e., energy, sustainability and structural performances); thus, we invite contributions dealing with:

  • Methodological papers and case studies concerning the optimization of building design integrating energy and structural aspects/techniques;
  • Numerical and experimental studies addressing physical and mechanical interactions between energy-efficiency measures and building components’ structural behavior;
  • Numerical and experimental studies addressing digital fabrication to develop new building envelope components with enhanced thermal and structural behavior.

We welcome the submission of original papers related to the above topics as well as those that deal generally with methodologies, numerical and experimental investigations, and case studies addressing building design.

Thank you for your contributions.

Prof. Dr. Gerardo Maria Mauro
Dr. Costantino Menna
Guest Editors

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Keywords

  • energy structural optimization
  • building envelope
  • building energy efficiency
  • sustainable design
  • seismic design
  • structural performance
  • safe built environment
  • digital fabrication
  • additive manufacturing
  • topology optimization

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Published Papers (2 papers)

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Research

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24 pages, 7297 KiB  
Article
The Impact of Passive Strategies on the Overall Energy Performance of Traditional Houses in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia
by Ali Aldersoni, Abdullah Albaker, Mansoor Alturki and Mohamed Ahmed Said
Buildings 2022, 12(11), 1837; https://doi.org/10.3390/buildings12111837 - 1 Nov 2022
Cited by 5 | Viewed by 3748
Abstract
Communities in nations all over the world must work to address the problem of energy consumption, which has emerged in modern times. Given that domestic consumers account for roughly 49% of the total electricity used annually by all sectors, buildings can be seen [...] Read more.
Communities in nations all over the world must work to address the problem of energy consumption, which has emerged in modern times. Given that domestic consumers account for roughly 49% of the total electricity used annually by all sectors, buildings can be seen as a key player in this conundrum. The architecture field can therefore play a vital role in saving energy, not only through building design but also through the materials used. To minimize architectural programmes’ negative impact on the environment, sustainable design that saves energy is being employed today in traditional Saudi Arabian buildings. This study examined whether current housing designs can effectively integrate four key passive energy-saving strategies: outdoor green area, thermal mass wall, window-to-wall ratio and shading device. This study analysed two types of traditional houses from two different cities in Saudi Arabia’s Najd region, Riyadh and Hail, examining the four passive strategies. Using traditional house designs, this paper created four simulation models for each house, and compared the simulation results with the base case model to determine how well these strategies could affect the energy consumption for residential buildings in Saudi Arabia (KSA). The results indicate that the selected strategies can play an important role in saving energy in residential buildings in the KSA. Full article
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Review

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12 pages, 17682 KiB  
Review
Thermal Effects of Vertical Greening in Summer: An Investigation on Evapotranspiration and Shading of Façade Greening in Vienna
by Tarja Salonen, Jutta Hollands, Eldira Sesto and Azra Korjenic
Buildings 2022, 12(10), 1705; https://doi.org/10.3390/buildings12101705 - 17 Oct 2022
Cited by 9 | Viewed by 2450
Abstract
Global urbanization is advancing, and with it, the densification of cities. Due to increased sealing of open spaces and the re-densification of existing urban settings, green spaces in the city are becoming scarcer. At the same time, greening within the urban fabric is [...] Read more.
Global urbanization is advancing, and with it, the densification of cities. Due to increased sealing of open spaces and the re-densification of existing urban settings, green spaces in the city are becoming scarcer. At the same time, greening within the urban fabric is known for its positive effects on the environment and decisively counteracts the urban heat effect. This study deals with the benefits of green façades for the environment as a cooling measure. Two façade greening systems, one trough and one cassette system, consisting of curtain wall elements with a basic metal structure, installed at a south-facing outdoor wall of a school building in Vienna, Austria, were taken under metrological examination. In order to evaluate the cooling effect caused by evapotranspiration, the amount of water evaporated was calculated using the difference of inflow and outflow. Furthermore, the surface temperatures of the greened and non-greened walls were measured to display the influence of the interaction of shading and evapotranspiration on the surrounding microclimate. The investigated vertical greening system with an area of 58 m2 has an average evaporation capacity of 101.38 L per day in the summer. The maximum surface temperature difference was measured to be 11.6 °C. Full article
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