This study targets to elucidate the essence of sustainability in green building design implementations. In this regard, the study draws attention to the sustainable energy performances of green buildings to identify the influential parameters based upon the contemporary successful accomplishments. The study elaborates on the contemporary trends and applications of green building design and the respective impacts on sustainable developments. As a result, the analytical review confirms that the sustainable energy performance of green buildings has been transformed to a sensible and practical resolution to alleviate the CO2 emissions and diminish the building sector energy consumption. In addition, with view to the current challenges and barriers, the study concludes that; it is still crucial to identify and develop efficient energy solutions associated with green buildings for addressing the future energy demands. Likewise, the findings highlight that the sustainable energy performances associated with integrated technologies and renewable energy systems are still intertwined with significant challenges related to the fundamental parameters of cost, maintenance, and operation. In conclusion, the contemplations of the research findings are recommended to be taken into consideration by architects, engineers and developers for the development of future eco-cities with an explicit viewpoint towards developing greener and smarter built environments.

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a b s t r a c tIn the context of intelligent environments, the smart houses are often pointed as one of the main constituents of smarter living environments. This study attempts to theoretically analyze case models of smart houses in order to identify their essence and characteristics. The results show that the most significant intelligent values embodied in smart houses embrace technologies of the functional automation. In fact, smart houses are substantially intertwined with integrated ICT technologies which aim to ensure comfortable living environments. Despite the identified challenges, the proliferation of smart houses into urban areas requires an integration of them in the city for creating intelligent environments. As a result, the promotion and integration of smart houses with other smarter elements of cities could archive a significant enhancement of the quality of life and a stronger urban sustainability.

Globally, artificial lighting accounts for a considerable part of electrical energy consumption in buildings. Hence, there is a need to design appropriate lighting scenarios for buildings in a way to reduce energy while meeting visual comfort requirements. This research aims to investigate the effects of applying different design strategies on lighting energy use and visual comfort level. Surface finishing reflectance, type, number and mounting height of luminaires are variables in the study. Lighting design software DIALux evo 7.0 provides simulations of a real scale room according to different scenarios whose models were calibrated and validated using experimental field data. The findings indicate that the type of luminaire is the most decisive parameter in quantity and quality of light in an indoor environment. However, increasing the indoor surface reflectance plays a key role in improving energy efficiency and visual comfort. The results show the possibility of electrical energy savings up to 45% by increasing surface reflectance properties. Finally, this paper stresses that there is no single design solution to guarantee both low energy demand and high visual quality, therefore integrating different strategies based on the type of task and the occupant’s activities is highly recommended.

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