Abstract
(1) The overall energy requirement of a building may be impacted by the building design, the selection of materials, the construction methods, and lifecycle management. To achieve an optimum energy-efficiency level when dealing with a new building or renovation project, it is important to improve the entire construction process as it is not enough to merely focus on the operational phase. If conventional construction practices do not evolve, compromise, or adapt to necessary changes, then it becomes challenging to deliver an ultimate low energy building. (2) This paper demonstrates the trend of off-site prefabrication and its production principles and the notions of open-building design and Design for X, as well as offering an overview of the development of automation in construction, which provides both insights and evaluations based on the context of the research. (3) Three European Union Horizon 2020 research projects were evaluated, and the outcome of the projects served as the backbone for the research and inspired the design of the proposed integrated façade system. Two design scenarios were proposed to demonstrate the potential improvements that could be achieved in a new build as well as in renovation projects. (4) The research lays a foundation for establishing a larger cross-disciplinary collaboration in the future.
Highlights
The construction industry is one of the major contributors to a nation’s economic growth, in which residential construction takes a huge proportion of the overall construction volume
(2) This paper demonstrates the trend of off-site prefabrication and its production principles and the notions of open-building design and Design for X, as well as offering an overview of the development of automation in construction, which provides both insights and evaluations based on the context of the research
As a low energy building designer, the following aspects shall be taken into consideration: selecting the appropriate building method and system according to the project brief; proposing an on-site erection method that increases productivity, affordability, and safety; considering a building as a collection of systems rather than a permanent individual piece; designing a low energy building that minimizes the energy required for heating and cooling but fundamentally reduces other energy use, such as embodied energy (EE), recurring embodied energy (REE), operating energy (OE), and demolition energy (DE)
Summary
The construction industry is one of the major contributors to a nation’s economic growth, in which residential construction takes a huge proportion of the overall construction volume. According to research conducted on lifecycle energy use in various building types, it is notable that building services, such as heating, ventilation and air conditioning (HVAC) systems represent as much as 25% of REE usage during the construction and renovation phases [8]. This finding shows that because the HVAC system is often an additional component of the building structure or envelope, it is usually installed after the building is constructed. The section will introduce the opportunities provided by off-site prefabrication methods, in particular, through a discussion on how to minimize the required energy throughout the building’s lifecycle by implementing off-site prefabrication methods
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