Abstract
The appliance of sustainable development approach in building has urged construction industry to adopt proper measurements to protect environment and reduce residential building energy consumption and CO2 emissions. Thus, an increasing interest in alternative building materials has developed including the use of bio-based materials such as cob which is studied in this paper. In the previous work, many experimental and numerical studies have been carried out to characterize thermal behaviour of earth buildings, reduce its thermal conductivity and water content. In this paper, an experimental study is carried out to determine the thermal properties and energy performance of cob building. Cob samples within different soil and fiber contents are studied using an experimental set up instrumented with flux meters and micro-thermocouples in order to evaluate the local heat flux and thermal conductivity during stationary regime. The results are analysed and compared to deduce the performant mixes in terms of thermal behaviour while respecting the French thermal regulation. A static thermal simulation based on RT 2012 calculation method (the official French calculation method for the energy performance of new residential and commercial buildings according to France thermal regulation) is used to compare energy performance between conventional and cob building using the French climate data base .
Highlights
Since the last past years, contemporaneous concerns about energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions have rapidly immerged intriguing environmentalists, researchers and public consciousness
A static thermal simulation based on RT 2012 calculation method is used to compare energy performance between conventional and cob building using the French climate data base
According to the last report “International Energy Outlook 2013”of the Energy Information Administration (EIA, 2013) the world energy consumption will rise to 56% between 2010 and 2040.Yet, Built environment is a substantial consumer of energy, according to Saidur R et al [2] the residential energy consumption reached 31% of the world energy in 2009
Summary
Since the last past years, contemporaneous concerns about energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions have rapidly immerged intriguing environmentalists, researchers and public consciousness. In the USA, primary energy consumption in the residential sector is estimated around 54% of consumption in the building sector, while in the EU it has increased by around 1%/year since 1990 (Environment and Energy Management Agency, 2012). As a response to the increasing energy consumption in buildings, many policies and means have been adopted in order to promote energy efficiency and sustainable buildings [3]. An increasing interest in alternative building materials such as bio-based materials earth has arisen because of the extensive environmental problems such as climate change and the impoverishment of resources combined with the rapid technological advancement within the building sector. Earth is often acknowledged as sustainable building material, based on its low embodied energy [4]. As described by Hamed et al [5], there are different types of earth buildings such as: Rammed earth buildings, Adobe, Wattle and Daub, Poured earth and cob that is studied in this paper
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