No abstract

No abstract

This paper, computer energy modeling is used to estimate the potential energy savings of refurbishing existing public federal housing in the United Arab Emirates. Such houses are built by the UAE Ministry of Public Works (MoPW) in five of the seven emirates that make up the UAE federation. The energy modeling was performed using the Integrated Environmental Solutions-Virtual Environment (IES-VE) commercial software. The study covered representative MoPW houses built in the period of 1974-2012. The results indicate potential energy savings upto 30.8% for the case of model 717 when refurbished to 2 Pearls standards compared to the as built configuration. The results showed little benefit in going from 1 Pearl to 2 Pearls refurbishment level. Thus 1 Pearl seems to be the most practical. This shows the high potential for energy, and thus environmental, savings should refurbishment be carried out on the homes built by the MoPW.

Computational modelling has been used to investigate the impact of vegetation on the microclimate in a campus courtyard in Qatar. Sixteen scenarios were tested during a hot day with over twenty thousand data entry points analysed for Air Temperature, Wind Speed, Mean Radiant Temperature and Predicted Mean Vote parameters. Trees provide direct shading, evapotranspiration and wind shielding which impacts thermal comfort conditions experienced locally as well as mitigating heat island effect. Vegetation has the ability to reduce excessive air temperature through sunlight interception. Its geometric configuration influences the amount of solar radiation, air temperature, humidity and wind velocity on microclimate of a given area. The study indicates that an equally distributed vegetation cover results in improved thermal comfort and a significant MRT reduction of 28.3C within the courtyard. The arrangement provides MRT improvement of 7.4C compared to the baseline scenario. The vegetation type also impacts the microclimate where trees of the same leaf density and higher trunk result in an increase of 0.2m/s in wind speed. The shaded grass areas witness a reduction of 1.1C of air temperature and 22C surface temperature compared to exposed hardscape. When replacing trees by shading structures, an increase of 3-5C MRT is witnessed along with an increase in reflected solar radiation. The study concluded that the placement of trees in a configuration that allows air movement and provision of shading as well as having an equally distributed vegetation cover are key to reduce both shortwave and long-wave radiation, avoid solar absorption and heat being trapped in the space.