Residential Buildings In Urban Areas Research Articles

Evaluation of the cost of residential buildings with environ-mentally friendly concepts

The initial stages of construction implementation begin with planning, implementation, and operation. From each stage of the project must be with a green or environmentally friendly concept. Eco-friendly planning in residential buildings starts from the use of building materials, energy-efficient design concepts, and economical development costs. In addition, the construction of houses must also pay attention to health, such as ventilation, garbage disposal, and the provision of green environments for plants. The costs analyzed in this study refer to environmentally friendly concepts that can be applied to the construction of residential houses. Residential buildings in urban areas generally have narrow land, so that the 1st floor building built is with an area of 36 m2, 45 m2, or 60 m2. The object of research in this case is building housing built by developers in general. As for the results of field observations, that environmentally friendly concepts that can be used are land arrangement, energy saving, healthy homes, and the use of environmentally friendly materials. Design modifications from existing conditions are the addition of loster, glassblock, the use of red brick, mild steel, and modification of water taps.

Performance based probabilistic seismic risk assessment for urban heritage. An example in Pla del Remei Area (Valencia)

The assessment of the seismic behaviour of historic residential buildings and the estimation of their possible losses in the event of an earthquake, is a must for defining strategic mitigation plans to prevent irreplaceable heritage losses. In this study an integrated performance based probabilistic risk assessment methodology is developed. An archival study and a field survey allow to identify architectural and construction characteristics of heritage residential buildings in urban areas and determine realistic structural models. These are analysed by using a limit state approach, coded in the FaMIVE method, considering different construction hypotheses, to produce capacity curves which support the identification of a discrete number of typologies representative of the entire building stock in the area. Their fragility functions are then derived using the modified N2 method. Because of the difficulty in quantifying the expected probable losses in purely economic terms, given the heritage value of these assets, losses are computed in terms of damaged floor surface area and mean damage ratio. These have been obtained through the earthquake loss estimation platform SELENA, considering different possible seismic scenarios. The procedure is applied to masonry residential buildings in Pla del Remei area of Valencia, Spain, built between the end of the 19th Century and the end of the Spanish War (1939). This neighbourhood embodies the cultural values, construction techniques and historic legacy of a new and brief era of modernity, inspired by the new urban theories and architectural styles of Eclecticism and Modernism. Despite Valencia being located in an area of low to moderate seismicity, the results show that the maximum percentage of built damaged area ranges from 5.8 to 11.6% for 475 years return period, increasing to 33.59–51.59% for 975 years return period. The high level of resolution of the study allows mapping and identifying the structures at higher risk and is therefore a valuable tool to support sensitive and targeted retrofitting policies.

APPRAISAL OF CONDITIONAL ATTRIBUTES OF RESIDENTIAL BUILDINGS IN AKURE, NIGERIA

The situation of residential buildings in urban areas must be assessed to ascertain their form and age, functions, convenience, and liveability. As a result, this paper evaluates selected aspects of the condition of residential buildings in Akure, Nigeria. The study's objectives include examining the types of housing units, plot coverage, the number of rooms, and building setbacks. Other factors include housing tenure, the condition of the in-house tap, the type of toilet facilities, and the age of the buildings. The study drew on both primary and secondary data sources. A total of 1,369 people were polled, with 684, 480, and 205 representing the core, transition, and peripheral zones. According to the findings, tenement buildings accounted for 62.3 percent of Akure's residential buildings. In the city core, 88.6 percent of the respondents developed their lands above 50 percent, while 20.0 percent developed their lands above 50 percent on the outskirts. The paper suggests that the relevant stakeholders should enforce the subsisting building regulations, introduce environmental inspectors and mobile courts, and the Ondo State government should invest in urban infrastructure.

Retrofit or rebuild? The future of old residential buildings in urban areas of China based on the analysis of environmental benefits

Abstract: From the 1970s to the 1990s, over 3.5 billion square meters of residential building areas were completed in China to accommodate the increased population in cities. Most of the constructed buildings were built without insulation and proper ventilation. Currently, these buildings are reaching the end of their designed service lifetime. Therefore, retrofitting and rebuilding represent two different options to upgrade or completely replace these old buildings. However, material utilization levels of retrofitting and the rebuilding plans are completely different, resulting in different embodied energy consumption and operation energy consumption levels. This study examines the old residential buildings located in the cold climate zone of China. The study found that rebuilding these old residential buildings normally attain higher embodied energy consumption and embodied CO2 emissions due to high material input. Therefore, rebuilding plans might not be the highest priority, and government managers should consider the environmental impacts from the embodied energy consumption when formulating decisions regarding the future of these old residential buildings. Additionally, the insulation thickness is an important parameter for the main building fabrics of retrofitted and rebuilt buildings to reduce heating and cooling energy demand. Although, this study has identified that the rebuilt buildings cause higher CO2 emissions than retrofitted buildings. However, various parameters, such as the materials’ embodied coefficient, the carbon intensity of the operation energy sources and ratios of the surface areas of the glazing windows to the external walls, should be considered by decision-makers.

A practical method to design the solar photovoltaic system applied on residential building in Indonesia

The use of solar PV system in Indonesia has expanded to various field and area. One example is residential buildings in urban areas. This article discusses calculation methods for designing a solar power generation system that is applied to residential buildings, such as homes, offices, or colleges. Electricity generated from the solar home system (SHS) is used to support many kinds of electrical equipments, where the electrical equipments are used by building occupants in their daily life. The calculation method is considered from the potential of solar energy and the reliability of the on-site system to generate electricity. The system is designed in an off-grid topology by exchanging connections with the public electricity grid owned by PLN. Calculation results shows that this SHS has a generation capacity of 1 kWp, 24 V 300 Ah battery storage, and a 200 W inverter. This SHS can reduce electricity usage in this sector by 18.2 kWh in average every month.

Towards achieving the best solution to utilize photovoltaic solar panels for residential buildings in urban areas

A way to find the best solution to utilize photovoltaic solar panels for residential buildings in urban areas is presented here. Three scenarios, namely, connecting to the grid with and without batteries, and full feed-in, are considered. After obtaining the optimal solution for each item, the best one is selected through a comprehensive comparison by considering energy, economic, and environmental criteria which are taken into account as the objective of the conducted multi-objective optimization. The combination of non-dominated sorting genetic algorithm II (NSGA-II) and technique for order preference by similarity to ideal solution (TOPSIS) is utilized for determination of the optimal answer for each scenario. A residential building complex in Tehran, Iran, as one of the biggest cities in the world is chosen as the case study. The results show that the full feed-in strategy offers the best condition among the alternatives. The optimal answer of this scenario enjoys the high performance ratio of 78.6 % (Performance ratio indicates the ratio of the actual to the theoretical energy output). Moreover, it provides levelized cost of electricity, payback period, and the internal rate of return of 0.15 $.(kWh)−1, 7.3 years, and 21.8 %, while it has the values of 487 $, 0.101 species.year, and 0.023 DALY for damage to resources, ecosystem, and human health, respectively.

The energy rebound effect of residential buildings: Evidence from urban and rural areas in China

Technological progress in energy efficiency is generally considered as an effective measure to address climate change issues. However, the expected results of such progress might be impacted by the rebound effect. Employing the linear approximation of the Almost Ideal Demand System (LA-AIDS) model, this paper aims to measure the direct rebound effect of residential buildings, considering the differences in the rebound effect for residential buildings between urban and rural China over the period 1994–2016. The empirical results reveal the magnitudes of direct rebound effect for residential energy consumption. The anticipated energy savings in residential buildings cannot be fully achieved in either urban or rural areas, and even significant “back-fire” effect exists in rural China. More specifically, the magnitudes of the rebound effect for residential buildings in urban areas fluctuate between 79.43% and 110.00%, while that in rural areas increase from 115.28% to 120.40%. The main reason of rebound effect is that the energy demand for residential buildings would increase when energy efficiency improves. This study provides a significant reference for the formulation of more targeted policies to achieve the anticipated energy savings, such as development of energy efficiency education program for urban residents and clean energy project for rural residents.

Assessing the adequacy and sustainability performance of multi-family residential buildings in Anambra State, Nigeria

The proliferation of multi-family residential building in Anambra State of Nigeria due to increasing demand without recourse to performance has brought concerns about the adequacy and sustainability of this housing type. This study therefore, assessed the adequacy and sustainability performance of multi-family residential buildings in urban areas of Anambra State. The study sampled the opinions of 384 households living in multi-family residential buildings through a questionnaire survey. We conducted data analysis based on 214 responses that were useful for analysis. The study found that internal and building component variables and supporting neighborhood variables were adequate, but the surrounding environment variables were inadequate based on Mean Score Index. However, based on Sustainability Performance Index, the occupants perceived social sustainability performance of the buildings as satisfactory, while environmental and economic sustainability performance were perceived as fairly satisfactory. The Pearson correlation coefficient result further established that adequacy of internal and building component variables was significantly and positively related to the residents’ perceived social sustainability performance. Adequacy of the surrounding environmental variables was also found to be positively and significantly related to the residents’ perceived environmental sustainability performance, whereas adequacy of supporting neighborhood facilities was found to be negatively and significantly related to the residents’ perceived economic sustainability performance. This suggested that investors and owners of multi-family residential buildings should direct more efforts towards improving the surrounding environment to supplements other facilities and increase the economic benefit of the renters or occupiers with increasing economic sustainability performance in terms of value for money.

Do Energy Conservation Strategies Limit the Freedom of Architecture Design? A Case Study of Minsheng Community, Taipei, Taiwan

The residential sector is one of the largest energy-consuming sectors in Taiwan. Taiwan applies building codes and appliance standards to reduce the total energy demand for buildings, especially for façade design. Some research studies demonstrate that design decisions regarding the envelope shape have a direct effect on a building’s energy performance. This paper presents a comparative study of four façade design strategies for low-rise residential buildings by combining energy performance and architectural creativity. The research aims to provide insights for Taiwan’s building designers and energy policymakers and to provide an overview of façade standards for residential buildings in urban areas that is not only innovative in design but also has an energy-saving potential. The approach used in this research combined the overhang and side fin shading design with an open plan, which allows for optimum daylight exposure across all spaces in order to reduce energy consumption.

Traffic noise exposure of high-rise residential buildings in urban area.

Noise pollution is a major factor of environmental complaints in many cities, which has significant impacts on human health. As a dominating source of environmental noise, the impact of road traffic noise is increasing. Residents living in high-rise buildings along the main road are severely affected by traffic noise. In order to assess the noise level of urban area along the main road in Guangzhou, three buildings were selected to conduct traffic noise measurements, and the questionnaire about traffic noise impact on human being was completed. Through the questionnaire, around 70% of participants consider the traffic noise has negative effect, and about 60% of participants consider the noise has moderate or much higher impact on physical comfort. Around 65% of participants consider the noise had moderately or much higher impact on their psychological comfort. By analyzing the measured data, all of the measured noise levels in three buildings exceed the recommended limit of 55 dB (A) in the daytime and 45 dB (A) in the night for residence, and the exceeded value can be up to 16 dB (A). By comparing the fitting curve of noise level transfer function on each floor relative to the reference floor, the quadratic polynomial was selected to plot the transfer function rather than cubic polynomial.

Exploring a zero food waste system for sustainable residential buildings in urban areas

Exploring a zero food waste system for sustainable residential buildings in urban areas

Building in Post-war Environments

Modern wars generate devastating effects on the environment by using chemical, biological, radioactive weapons. Toxic effects persist for long time on war fields. Negative environmental impacts such as desertification, migrant masses, depletion of natural resources (food, water, wood, etc.), and induced biodiversity produce, in turn, conflicts.This paper aims at i) identifying the consequences of conflicts and wars on the built environment with special reference to the industrial and residential buildings in urban areas; ii) determining the environmental impact of the procurement and use of natural resources and materials for the reconstruction of human settlements; iii) describing the results of this contribution according to their practical use. The research starts with a critical analysis of international examples related to modern wars. Contemporary situations of environmental degradation also related to major natural disasters that have altered the context in which they happened have been then analysed. Moreover, results of some significant interventions of environmental clean-up and building reconstruction have been examined, together with guidelines of the international humanitarian organizations on aspects of health and quality of life in areas with depleted environment. Results of these studies permit to suggest a post war methodology for the revitalization of the territory with restocking and monitored rebuilding, coordinated with contextual recovery of ecosystems. Construction techniques, with characteristics of resilience, habitability and sustainability are finally proposed. These solutions must also strive for reintegration of personal property and for the definitive localization of residents respecting their traditions and culture.Overall, this paper gives an operative contribution to one of the most important problems of humanity, which can be useful to future researches on territories marked by the environmental degradation caused by wars. Recovered environments, made sustainable, may help to understand that the real solution is avoiding wars and their deleterious effects.

Steady-state and transient thermal measurements of green roof substrates

There has been growing interest in using extensive green roofs for commercial and residential buildings in urban areas. Green roofs provide many benefits, including adding an additional insulation layer. The potential of this benefit depends on many factors, including the thermal properties of the green roof substrate. Thermal conductivity values of three substrates comprised primarily of scoria, crushed roof tile and bottom-ash were measured with steady-state and transient techniques under three moisture conditions. Specific heat capacities of the green roof substrates were also measured with a transient technique. Steady-state measurements were performed with a “k-Matic” apparatus while transient measurements with KD2 Pro needles. In general, the steady-state measurements showed more consistency than transient measurements. Thermal conductivity differed among the three substrates: crushed roof tile had the highest conductivity values across all moisture contents. Substrate moisture content consistently increased thermal conductivity across all substrates, but this was significantly greater for the crushed roof tile substrate. Steady-state thermal conductivity curves were fitted using the thermal conductivity model for green roof substrates adopted by Sailor (2011). The coefficients obtained are presented and can be used in green roof models to quantify the thermal performance of green roofs and building energy savings.

STUDIES ON REINFORCED HOLLOW CONCRETE BLOCK MASONRY

Masonry may be defined as the assemblage of building units joined with the help of cementitious material or any accepted joining material to perform required function. It has its own reputation and performs multi-functions in load bearing structures such assupporting loads, dividing spaces, thermal and acoustic insulation, weather and fire protection etc, but it has to be provided separately in framed structures. In present scenario, there is a great demand for construction of Multi-storied residential buildings in urban area because of needful requirements. Most of such buildings are constructed using RC-framed structure. On the other hand RC-framed structures are expensive and relatively difficult to construct because of the need for formwork. Masonry has a great benefit since it does not need form work. If moderate to High strength Engineered hollow concrete blocks are available, one can think of providing reinforcement through the core of such Hollow blocks. In this project an attempt has been made to obtain the load carrying capacity of Reinforced Hollow Concrete Block Masonry through experimental investigation by considering two different percentages of steels for this totally four number of Reinforced hollow concrete block masonry prisms (RHCBM) using 12 mm diameter bar and six number of Reinforced hollow concrete block masonry prisms (RHCBM) using 8 mm diameter bar were casted and tested. Further, an attempt has been made to compare the experimental load carrying capacity with the conventional mechanics based approach used for analyzing short columns. There was a fairly good corelation between the analysis and experiments.

Sustainability assessment and rating of buildings: Developing the methodology SBTool PT–H

Although sustainable building is a multidimensional concept, attention to the issue often focuses solely on environmental indicators, ignoring the substantial importance of social, economic and cultural indicators. Building sustainability involves various relations between built, natural and social systems and therefore comprises a complex of different priorities that require consideration at each stage of a building’s life-cycle. To cope with this complexity and to support sustainability systematic, holistic and practical approaches to building design need to be developed. The main objective of a systematic methodology is to support the development of a building design that achieves the most appropriate balance between the different sustainability dimensions, and is, at the same time, practical, transparent and flexible enough to be easily adapted to different types of buildings and technology. It is the aim of this paper to present an innovative approach for developing building sustainability assessment and rating, and to contribute to the evolution of generic methodology and international understanding by introducing an approach which takes the different dimensions of sustainability into account. The scope of the methodology presented in this paper (SBTool PT–H) is to assess the sustainability of existing, new and renovated residential buildings in urban areas, specifically in the Portuguese context.

The feedback of heat rejection to air conditioning load during the nighttime in subtropical climate

Taipei City, located in the subtropical zone, has a basin landform. The summer is always hot and humid and the air temperature right after sunset is typically higher than 30 °C. Heat rejection from residential buildings in urban area, equipped with lots of the window type air conditioners, not only increases the air temperature outside, but also burdens the cooling load. Based on the time schedule of air conditioner use of Taipei citizens, the heat rejection/building energy use and the air temperature distribution were evaluated, and finally the additional electric consumption of air conditioners was predicted. Two software, EnergyPlus (building energy program) and Windperfect (CFD, computational fluid dynamics software) were employed in this study. In the CFD simulation, the geometry of buildings that covers 700 m in diameter was created with GIS (geographical information system) and the total mesh number was more than 3 millions. Three specified temperatures ( T am, T bu and T ac) were used to describe the temperature distribution within the urban canopy by hourly time variation and spatial distribution with height and horizontal profile. The results revealed that the temperature gradually increased with height and the temperature next to the buildings was always higher than the ambient air. The feedback (penalty) of heat rejection to cooling load was found 10.7% during 19:01 to 02:00 h on the following day.