A new comprehensive paper on the practice's innovative hybrid building in Beijing is published in the International Journal of Ventilation including discussion on appropriate adaptive comfort standards, the detailed design, simulations of various options including the resilience of the as-built scheme.
Full ref. C. Alan Short, Runming Yao, Guozhi Luo, Baizhan Li, (2012) ‘Exploiting a hybrid environmental design strategy in the continental climate of Beijing’ The International Journal of Ventilation, vol.11, no.2, September 2012. www.ijovent.org.uk
C. Alan Short1,4,
Runming Yao2, Guozhi Luo3,5, Baizhan Li3,
1 Department of Architecture,
University of Cambridge,1-5 Scroope Terrace, Cambridge CB21PX,UK
2School of Construction
Management and Engineering, the University of Reading,
Whiteknights,
PO Box 219, Reading RG6 6AW, UK
3 Key
Laboratory of the Three Gorges Reservoir Region’s Eco-Environment, Ministry of
Education; Faculty of Urban Construction and Environmental Engineering,
Chongqing, China
4 Short and Associates Chartered
Architects, Lansbury House, 3 St.Mary’s Place, Stamford, Lincolnshire, PE9 2DN,
UK
5 Southwest Architectural Design
Institute, Chengdu, China
Abstract
The
built environment in China is required to achieve a 50% reduction in carbon
emissions by 2020 against the 1980 design standard. A particular challenge is
how to maintain acceptable comfort conditions through the hot humid summers and
cold desiccating winters of its continental climate regions. Fully
air-conditioned sealed envelopes, often fully glazed, are becoming increasingly
common in these regions. Remedial strategies involve technical refinements to
the air-handling equipment and a contribution from renewable energy sources in
an attempt to achieve the prescribed net reduction in energy use. However an
alternative hybrid environmental design strategy is developed in this research
project. It exploits observed temperate periods of weeks, days, even hours in
duration to free-run an office and exhibition building configured to promote
natural stack ventilation when ambient conditions permit and mechanical
ventilation when conditions require it, the two modes delivered through the
same physical infrastructure. The proposal is modelled in proprietary software
and the methodology adopted is described. The challenge is compounded by its
first practical application to an existing reinforced concrete frame originally
designed to receive a highly glazed envelope. This original scheme is reviewed in
comparison. Furthermore the practical delivery of the proposal value engineered
out a proportion of the ventilation stacks. The likely consequence of this for
the environmental performance of the building is investigated through a
sensitivity study.
Key
words: sustainable design, natural ventilation, hybrid, mixed
mode, sustainable refurbishment
