Abstract
Environmental thermal loading on urban buildings is expected to increase owing to the combined influence of a warming climate, increasing frequency and severity of extreme heat events, and the urban heat island (UHI) effect. This paper presents how a computationally efficient estimation pathway could be utilised to understand UHI influence on building energy simulations. As an example, this is examined by considering UHI influence on the space-conditioning loads of office buildings within urban and suburban conditions, and how the trend of replacing heavyweight facades with lightweight alternatives could affect their surrounding microclimates, as well as building energy use. The paper addresses this through simulations of street canyons based on the urban Moorgate and suburban Wimbledon areas of London. Results show that with all scenarios including the UHI within a dynamic thermal simulation presents between 2.5 and 9.6% net increase in annual space-conditioning. The study also demonstrates that the trend in urban centres to replace heavyweight facades with lightweight insulated alternatives increases space-conditioning loads, which in turn increases UHI intensity to create a warming feedback loop. The study therefore stresses the significance of including microclimate loading from the UHI in estimating urban and suburban energy use, and the combined simulation approach is presented as a computationally efficient pathway for use by built environment designers.
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Disclaimer: All third-party content on this website/platform is and will remain the property of their respective owners and is provided on "as is" basis without any warranties, express or implied. Use of third-party content does not indicate any affiliation, sponsorship with or endorsement by them. Any references to third-party content is to identify the corresponding services and shall be considered fair use under The CopyrightLaw.