This research examines energy consumption of public housing in Sao Paulo, Brazil and how changes in the current design practice affect building's energy consumption and comfort level. The hypothesis is that energy-efficient design concepts applied to the public housing design in Sao Paulo could significantly reduce energy consumption in buildings. Computer simulation is used to evaluate the current buildings' energy performance and to simulate the performance of new energy-saving design strategies. The findings show that energy consumption can be reduced by as much as 54% by implementing the new design strategies. This study highlights the many opportunities for architects to change the public housing scenario in Sao Paulo. It showed that changes carefully applied to the current design process can significantly enhance building's energy performance and comfort level inside the envelope.

This research examines how public housing design has been developed to attend the low income population in Sao Paulo, Brazil and how changes in the existing design affect the quality of the dwellings and energy consumption. The hypothesis of this research is that energy efficient architecture concepts applied to the current design practices of public housing in Sao Paulo significantly reduce energy consumption in buildings. In this study, computer simulation is used to evaluate current energy performance of public housing buildings and to simulate the integration of new energy saving features into the current design to assess buildings’ performance. The findings show that energy consumption can be reduced by as much as 54 percent in doing so. This study highlights the numerous opportunities for architects to influence the quality of the design being produced for the less fortunate population in public housing sector in Sao Paulo. This also positively impacts comfort conditions within buildings and most importantly, reduce energy consumption.