Energy retrofit of an existing affordable building envelope in Spain, case study

Building retrofit measures provide a significant means of mitigating the effect of climate change on buildings by enhancing building energy performance at a beneficial cost-effectiveness. An insight into the applicable building retrofit measures within a climate zone will guide the optimisation framework to attaining sustainability in architecture and the built environment. This article presents a brief overview of recent studies on retrofit measures and its application on a variety of buildings in hot-summer–cold-winter climates, with emphasis on Shanghai. Findings show that the major retrofit measures include improvement in the building envelope, heating, ventilation and cooling (HVAC) and lighting, supported by photovoltaic (PV) systems, accordingly. Furthermore, the study identifies key elements and plausible challenges for the evaluation of building retrofit measures in this region. In this regard, financial barriers and lack of standards and regulatory support are the main challenges identified. These insights provide a systematic approach to guide building researchers, practitioners and decision-makers in the design and development of existing and new retrofit measures for the future of rapidly growing cities with a broad climate variation scope.

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Improving building envelope performance with respect to thermal, sound insulation, and lighting: a case study

Building Acoustics ◽

10.1177/1351010x19877280 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 26 (4) ◽

pp. 243-262

Author(s):

Shahryar Habibi

Keyword(s):

Energy Performance ◽

Building Envelope ◽

Sound Insulation ◽

Indoor Environmental Quality ◽

The Novel ◽

Existing Building ◽

Energy Retrofit ◽

Overall Evaluation ◽

Indoor Comfort

This study concerns an overall evaluation of building envelopes, for what concerns the energy, acoustic and lighting performances. It combines different topics of energy and indoor comfort, with the aim to improve the livability of an existing building (a social housing) by means of a comprehensive retrofit of their envelopes. The novel contribution of this study is to apply some methods for energy retrofit of a building envelope in such a way that objectives are achieved within the state-of-the-art combination simulation, optimization approaches, and equations describing the calculations of sound insulation in buildings. The results showed that properties of building envelope like the value of transmittance of the glass window and thermal properties of materials have an impact on indoor environmental quality and energy performance.

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Information Exchange Requirements to Support Commissioning of HVAC and Building Envelope Components During an Energy Retrofit Project—A Comparative Case Study

Computing in Civil and Building Engineering (2014) ◽

10.1061/9780784413616.184 ◽

2014 ◽

Author(s):

Miguel Moral ◽

Burcu Akinci ◽

Mario Berges

Keyword(s):

Information Exchange ◽

Building Envelope ◽

Comparative Case Study ◽

Energy Retrofit

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Energy Retrofit. A Case Study—Santi Romano Dormitory on the Palermo University

Sustainability ◽

10.3390/su132413524 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 13 (24) ◽

pp. 13524

Author(s):

Domenico Curto ◽

Vincenzo Franzitta ◽

Andrea Guercio ◽

Domenico Panno

Keyword(s):

Input Data ◽

Energy Savings ◽

Electrical Energy ◽

Energy System ◽

Careful Analysis ◽

Initial Energy ◽

Building Envelope ◽

Energy Retrofit ◽

Reduction Of Energy Consumption

Electrical and thermal consumption related to buildings, whether civil, commercial, public, or of any other kind, is very much in focus today. With today’s targets for energy savings, reduction of consumption, and environmental impact, it is necessary to carry out energy retrofits to modernize installations and their management. The realization of an effective improvement requires a careful analysis of the case study because each category of building has different requirements such as different load profiles and different installations and needs. This was carried out by studying the electrical and thermal load profiles. A good initial energy audit can provide the retrofit solutions capable of achieving the reduction of energy consumption and the emission of climate-changing gases into the atmosphere. A case study, carried out by the Department of Engineering of Palermo, showed how it is possible to perform an energy retrofit to modernize the energy system of the student dormitory at the University of Palermo. The paper presented a study carried out by programming a series of interlinked calculations in Microsoft Excel. In order to quantify the energy savings of the structure under examination, it is necessary to enter some input data, thanks to which all the formulas implemented in the calculation software were automatically completed. The programming of the calculations makes it possible to carry out an energy retrofit with interventions on the building envelope and the installations. The desire to program an automated calculation by modifying only the input data is intended to replicate a study on other buildings with the same peculiarities. In this way, it is possible to verify which retrofit hypotheses would be useful to upgrade old public administration buildings. In the analyzed case study, 65% of electrical energy and 33% of thermal energy could be saved by replacing generation systems, installing a co-generator, replacing windows, and replacing lamps with LED ones.

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Holistic approach for energy retrofit with volumetric add-ons toward nZEB target: Case study of a dormitory in Athens

Energy and Buildings ◽

10.1016/j.enbuild.2019.109630 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 207 ◽

pp. 109630 ◽

Cited By ~ 2

Author(s):

Margarita-Niki Assimakopoulos ◽

Rosa Francesca De Masi ◽

Anastasia Fotopoulou ◽

Dimitra Papadaki ◽

Silvia Ruggiero ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Holistic Approach ◽

Energy Retrofit

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An Analytical Approach for the Selection of Technologies to be Integrated in a Plug&play Façade Unit: The RenoZEB Case Study

Proceedings ◽

10.3390/proceedings2020065029 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 65 (1) ◽

pp. 29

Author(s):

Alessandro Pracucci ◽

Sara Magnani ◽

Laura Vandi ◽

Oscar Casadei ◽

Amaia Uriarte ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Building Envelope ◽

Design System ◽

Decision Matrix ◽

Design Guideline ◽

Existing Building ◽

Building Conditions ◽

Zero Energy Building ◽

System A ◽

Selection Of

The nearly Zero Energy building (nZEB) renovation market is currently the key feature in the construction sector. RenoZEB aims to develop a systematic approach for retrofitting by assembling different technologies in a plug and play building envelope. This paper presents the methodology used to transform the RenoZEB concept in the design system. A multi-criteria decision matrix is used for the selection of the best façade technologies within the market while the analysis of the existing building conditions allows to develop a replicable approach for designing deep retrofitting intervention through a plug&play façade. The methodology appears to be a valuable support for the selection of technologies and allows to define a design guideline for the envelope.

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