Climate-Driven Architectural Design Optimization and Exploration, A Reverse Passive Building Design Approach

Abstract

This paper presents a reverse passive building design approach for sustainable architectural design based on the use of performance-based design optimization. The approach considers building massing and orientation, both of which are of great importance in passive building design, and combines the two factors in a design generation and optimization workflow in Rhino-Grasshopper. A case study based on SDE4 building in Singapore is conducted to demonstrate its capability of providing solutions and information about the trade-offs and interrelation between building massing and orientation with respect to the consideration of passive cooling and natural daylighting. The result shows that the approach can systematically explore a variety of building massing designs with different orientations and identify high-performing designs that outperform the existing one regarding the two performance objectives. The paper concludes by discussing its relevance in connecting performance-based design optimization research and architecture professionals.