Energy conservation strategies for school buildings in Riyadh

Abstract

SYNOPSIS Although the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia is one of the main oil producing countries, yet the latest five year development plan calls for energy conservation [1]. Due to the expansion of the Saudi economy which is reflected by the challenging and ambitious development in various sectors such as housing, health, industry, agriculture, education etc, the consumption of electric energy experienced a sharp increase during the last twenty years. Electric energy consumption in the central region of Saudi Arabia increased from 4,236,000 MWh in 1981 to 12,996,000 MWh in 1988. Since 1983 the Ministry of Education started implementing various strategies to conserve energy consumption by school buildings. In the 1990s more attention is geared towards improving the U-value of the external envelope through the use of hollow blocks and thermal insulation. This study is an attempt to investigate the effectiveness of the use of thermal insulation and hollow blocks in reducing energy consumption. This is conducted by the analysis of actual electric energy consumption of some selected examples of school buildings in Riyadh. Also the study will investigate other energy conservation strategies which might yield additional energy savings. This shall be carried out through the analysis of Riyadh climate.