Inter-Building Effect and Its Relation with Highly Reflective Envelopes on Building Energy Use: Case Study for Cities of Japan

Jihui Yuan,Kazuo Emura,Craig Farnham

doi:10.3390/atmos8110211

Abstract

The built environment with respect to building envelope designs and the surrounding micro-environment significantly affects building energy use. The influence of the inter-building effect (IBE) on building energy use cannot be ignored and thermal properties of building envelopes also largely affect building energy use. In order to evaluate the influence of IBE and its relation with highly-reflective (HR) building envelopes on building energy use, the building energy use under three simulated scenarios was quantitatively analyzed using the building energy optimization software “BEopt” for five cities of Japan. Analysis indicated that when the simulated building is neighbored by other buildings, an envelope coated with HR material is more effective than lowly-reflective (LR) material to reduce building energy use. A simulated single building without surrounding buildings and a LR envelope has the highest building energy use among the three simulated scenarios. This study also showed the influence of IBE on building energy savings is stronger in cities with lower latitudes.

Highlights

The rapidly growing world energy use has already raised concerns over supply difficulties, exhaustion of energy resources, and heavy environmental impacts, such as ozone layer depletion, global warming, climate change, etc
The comparison between Scenario A and Scenario B (IBE with LR building envelope) by BEopt analysis indicated that the building with surrounding buildings is more effective than that without surrounding buildings in terms of reducing annualized energy use, annualized utility bills and annualized energy related costs for five representative cities of Japan
It is necessary to consider the influence of inter-building effect (IBE) (Scenario B), buildings with more floors in the survey; and (ii) the usage conditions of the actual buildings are likely different from the simulated building, i.e., the number of people in the building, use of equipment in the building, not using 24-h air conditioning as in the simulation, and other human factors, etc

Summary

Introduction

The rapidly growing world energy use has already raised concerns over supply difficulties, exhaustion of energy resources, and heavy environmental impacts, such as ozone layer depletion, global warming, climate change, etc. Previous research has indicated that the global contribution from buildings towards energy consumption, both residential and commercial, has steadily increased to between 20% and 40% in developed countries, and has exceeded the other major sectors: industrial and transportation [1]. The nation’s 114 million households and more than 4.7 million commercial buildings consume more energy than the transportation or industry sectors, accounting for nearly 40% of total. U.S energy use [2]. Cities represent the highest concentration of energy use; they occupy 2% of the. Their inhabitants consume about 75% of the world’s resources [3]. A report showed that buildings account for the largest proportion of energy consumption, with as much as 32%

Methods

Results

Discussion

Conclusion