A Trombe wall is a massive equator-facing wall that is painted a dark color in order to absorb thermal energy from incident sunlight and covered with a glass on the outside with an insulating air-gap between the wall and the glaze. A Trombe wall is a passive solar building design strategy that adopts the concept of indirect-gain, where sunlight first strikes a solar energy collection surface in contact with a thermal mass of air. The sunlight absorbed by the mass is converted to thermal energy (heat) and then transferred into the living space.
In passive solar building design, windows, walls, and floors are made to collect, store, reflect, and distribute solar energy, in the form of heat in the winter and reject solar heat in the summer. This is called passive solar design because, unlike active solar heating systems, it does not involve the use of mechanical and electrical devices.
Daylighting is the practice of placing windows, skylights, other openings, and reflective surfaces so that direct or indirect sunlight can provide effective internal lighting. Particular attention is given to daylighting while designing a building when the aim is to maximize visual comfort or to reduce energy use. Energy savings can be achieved from the reduced use of artificial (electric) lighting or from passive solar heating. Artificial lighting energy use can be reduced by simply installing fewer electric lights where daylight is present or by automatically dimming or switching off electric lights in response to the presence of daylight – a process known as daylight harvesting.
Spencer Plaza is a shopping mall located on Anna Salai in Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India, and is one of the modern landmarks of the city. Originally built during the period of the British Raj and reconstructed in 1985 on the site of the original Spencer's department store, it is the oldest shopping mall in India and was one of the biggest shopping malls in South Asia when it was built. It is one of the earliest Grade A commercial projects of the city, which were developed in the second half of the 1990s. As of March 2010, it is the 11th largest mall in the country, with a gross leasable (retail) area of 530,000 sq ft.
A building envelope or building enclosure is the physical separator between the conditioned and unconditioned environment of a building, including the resistance to air, water, heat, light, and noise transfer.
A Zero-Energy Building (ZEB), also known as a Net Zero-Energy (NZE) building, is a building with net zero energy consumption, meaning the total amount of energy used by the building on an annual basis is equal to the amount of renewable energy created on the site or in other definitions by renewable energy sources offsite, using technology such as heat pumps, high efficiency windows and insulation, and solar panels.
A ground-coupled heat exchanger is an underground heat exchanger that can capture heat from and/or dissipate heat to the ground. They use the Earth's near constant subterranean temperature to warm or cool air or other fluids for residential, agricultural or industrial uses. If building air is blown through the heat exchanger for heat recovery ventilation, they are called earth tubes.
The Barra system is a passive solar building technology developed by Horazio Barra in Italy. It uses a collector wall to capture solar radiation in the form of heat. It also uses the thermosiphon effect to distribute the warmed air through channels incorporated into the reinforced concrete floors, warming the floors and hence the building. Alternatively, in hot weather, cool nighttime air can be drawn through the floors to chill them in a form of air conditioning.
A ground source heat pump is a heating/cooling system for buildings that use a type of heat pump to transfer heat to or from the ground, taking advantage of the relative constancy of temperatures of the earth through the seasons. Ground-source heat pumps (GSHPs) – or geothermal heat pumps (GHP), as they are commonly termed in North America – are among the most energy-efficient technologies for providing HVAC and water heating, using far less energy than can be achieved by burning a fuel in a boiler/furnace or by use of resistive electric heaters.
Building-integrated photovoltaics (BIPV) are photovoltaic materials that are used to replace conventional building materials in parts of the building envelope such as the roof, skylights, or façades. They are increasingly being incorporated into the construction of new buildings as a principal or ancillary source of electrical power, although existing buildings may be retrofitted with similar technology. The advantage of integrated photovoltaics over more common non-integrated systems is that the initial cost can be offset by reducing the amount spent on building materials and labor that would normally be used to construct the part of the building that the BIPV modules replace. In addition, BIPV allows for more widespread solar adoption when the building's aesthetics matter and traditional rack-mounted solar panels would disrupt the intended look of the building.
The Green Building purports to be an environmentally conscious mixed-use development situated in Manchester. The Green Building was designed by Farrells, who aimed to create a sustainable environment on an unusual triangular plot, adjacent to Oxford Road station. The building was constructed by Taylor Woodrow as part of the Macintosh Village development, which was formerly a Dunlop tyre factory and also the birthplace of the Mackintosh raincoat.
The Green Building is a building located in the East Market District (NuLu) of Louisville, Kentucky. It is Louisville's first commercial Platinum LEED certified building, and Kentucky's first Platinum LEED adaptive reuse structure. The building, designed by Los Angeles architecture firm (fer) studio, was awarded Platinum certification in 2010. Design principals, Doug Pierson and Chris Mercier, are both former senior project architects with Frank Gehry's Los Angeles office, Gehry Partners LLP.
Sustainable refurbishment describes working on existing buildings to improve their environmental performance using sustainable methods and materials. A refurbishment or retrofit is defined as: "any work to a building over and above maintenance to change its capacity, function or performance' in other words, any intervention to adjust, reuse, or upgrade a building to suit new conditions or requirements". Refurbishment can be done to a part of a building, an entire building, or a campus. Sustainable refurbishment takes this a step further to modify the existing building to perform better in terms of its environmental impact and its occupants' environment.
The Samrat Ashok Convention Centre is a convention centre on North Gandhi Maidan Marg, Patna, Bihar with an estimated budget of ₹490 crore. The foundation stone of the centre was laid by Nitish Kumar, the chief minister of Bihar on 8 February 2014. An expected, around 16,500 metric tonnes of steel is used in construction, which is more than the volume of steel used in raising Eiffel Tower and Indira Gandhi International Airport, New Delhi. The capacity of the main auditorium is around 5000. The Samrat Ashoka Convention centre has three major signature buildings- 1) Bapu Sabahagaar, an auditorium of 5000 seating capacity, 2) Gyan Bhawan with 800 capacity auditorium, multipurpose hall and other conference halls of various capacities; and 3) Sabhyata Dwar. The centre was completed by April 2017 and has Gyan Bhawan, Bapu Sabhagaar, Multipurpose Hall, Plenary Hall, Modular Meeting Rooms with Basement Parking, Sabhyta Park With Sabhyata Dwar & food plaza. In February 2018, Samrat Ashoka Convention Kendra Patna won the 10th CIDC Vishwakarma Achievement Award for best construction projects in India.
The Glossary of Geothermal Heating and Cooling provides definitions of many terms used within the Geothermal heat pump industry. The terms in this glossary may be used by industry professionals, for education materials, and by the general public.
The David and Lucile Packard Foundation Headquarters is the corporate headquarters of the David and Lucile Packard Foundation, located in Los Altos, California. The Packard Foundation was created in 1964 by David Packard and his wife Lucile Salter Packard, one of the top 100 grant-making foundations in the United States, with the goals of improving the lives of children, enabling the creative pursuit of science, advancing reproductive health, and conserving and restoring the Earth’s natural systems. The David and Lucile Packard Foundation Headquarters is designed by EHDD to be the largest net zero energy building in California, and it has successfully reduced the energy use by 65% over conventional buildings.
The INTEGER Millennium House is a demonstration house in Watford, England that opened to the public in 1998. It was renamed The Smart Home after being refurbished in 2013. The house was originally intended to showcase innovations in design and construction, building intelligence, and environmental performance. The INTEGER design included many innovative features, including environmental technology such as a green roof and a grey water recycling system, home automation that included a building management system and an intelligent security system, and innovative technical systems such as under-floor trench heating. In 2013, the house was refurbished and retrofitted with a variety of new and upgraded features, including a building-integrated photovoltaic (BIPV) array, which altogether halved its carbon emissions and increased its energy efficiency by 50%. Since its creation, the house has garnered numerous awards, appeared on Tomorrow's World on BBC Television, hosted thousands of visitors, and influenced mainstream construction.
The CTBC Financial Park, or Chinatrust Commercial Bank Headquarters, is a skyscraper office complex located in Nangang District, Taipei, Taiwan. Construction of the complex began in 2010 and it was completed in 2013. The complex consists of three towers with a total floor area of 266,290 m2 (2,866,300 sq ft). The height of Block A is 139 m (456 ft), and it comprises 30 floors above ground, as well as five basement levels. The height of Block B is 99.4 m (326 ft), and it comprises 20 floors above ground, as well as five basement levels. The height of Block C is 66.7 m (219 ft), and it comprises 14 floors above ground, as well as five basement levels. It houses the headquarters of CTBC Financial Holding and is situated in close proximity to Nangang Software Park and Taipei Nangang Exhibition Center.
The Mosaic Centre for Conscious Community and Commerce is located in the suburban neighbourhood of Summerside in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. While originally being designed for Oil Country Engineering Services, the building continues to focus on the engagement within local businesses and the interaction of its users. The main concept within the Mosaic was to build a healthy, sustainable building that continues to produce as much energy as it uses. Many different sustainability techniques were used throughout the design of the building, helping its net-zero energy status within a cold, northern climate.
