VISUALIZING BUILDING PERFORMANCE
VISUALIZING BUILDING PERFORMANCE
DATE:8th of April 2011
Venue: ARUP’s London Office
8 Fitzroy Street, London, W1T 4BQ
To register send an e-mail to Dr Jake Hacker (jake.hacker@arup.com)
FREE EVENT SPONSORED BY ARUP
This event seeks to open the discussion on directions to improve the ability to communicate building simulation results to clients and the design team. Currently, results from Building and urban environments simulation tools are used to inform policy making decisions on possible measures to reduce the built environment’s carbon footprint. These tools provide quantitative answers on predicted consumption and possible savings from adopting a number of energy saving scenarios. Although these tools have been continuously developing and improving since the 1970s they are still criticized of being limited in their scope, unfriendly to users, and with built-in simplifications to complex building science phenomena. Data output is presented as a plethora of numbers and tables that are difficult to analyze. This has cast some doubts on the need to use building simulation tools, is it a design tool or boardroom visualization? And if so, how can we increase the opportunity of the building simulation team to communicate their ideas to the design team involved so it can have a positive impact on providing better places for people and buildings that deliver a reduced carbon footprint?
10:00 Registration
10:20 Welcome – Dr Malcolm Cook (Loughborough University)
10:30-11:00 Building Performance simulation a design tool or boardroom visualizations?
Dr. Neveen Hamza (Newcastle University)
11:00- 11:30 Predicting ‘the Pinnacle’. Dan Jestico (Director of R&D Hilson Moran)
Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) has been used to simulate ventilated
façade performance for this central London building. The presentation
describes a number of key design parameters: (a) Designing the façade to ensure thermal regulation of internal space, (b) Using double skin façades with mixed mode ventilation, (c) How to control this efficiently through the building management system, (d) How to ensure enough air flows through the façade cavity into the office space, (e) Preventing unwanted draughts in the office space, (f) Meeting the design / engineering balance between maximum floor space & maximal façade performance
11:30-12:00 Visualizing ‘the circadian potential’ of Daylight in buildings (Dr. John Mardaljevic-De Montfort University)
Daylight levels previously thought of mainly in terms of task illumination and aesthetics/design, is now firmly established for its measurable biochemical effects on the human body, in particular with respect to maintaining a healthy sleep - wake cycle. In this presentation, a residential building under a variety of different European climates is assessed in relation to the annual ‘circadian potential’ of a number of calculation point. The various modelling procedures and assumptions are described, and a novel means of visualising the ‘circadian potential’ of a point in space is presented.
12:00-12:45p.m Lunch Break
12:45-1:15 "Better Visualisation is better Information: Concepts and Case Studies" Christopher Pountney Building Engineering-AECOM)
Information visualisation aims at providing insight into complex data sets. The increased use of dynamic thermal modelling provides the context in which better visualisation can be used to quickly inform readers of the implications of design decisions. This talk will outline basic information visualisation principles and identify lessons learned from recent case studies."
1:15-1:45 Visualization of Building Performance; ARUP’s perspectives. (Steve Walker, Associate Director, Environmental Physics)
1:45:2:15 Moving beyond building performance simulation: towards better visualisation for delivering masterplanning and place making Dr. Husam Al Waer (Dundee University)
Although the master planning is not frequently used in government planning guidance, masterplanning has had a strong revival in recent years. The demand for strategic thinking about the process of masterplanning change is growing rapidly, as local authorities and decision makers, urban regeneration companies, private developers and communities alike need to think about physical change at a large scale and moving beyond green building. The ultimate aim of this presentation is to encourage high standards for the scope and content of sustainable masterplanning where a new framework will be presented (SuBETool). This will look at how masterplanning likely performance simulation could be visualised revealing, the many different factors that affect the expected performance of the development - and how that performance could be improved. This enables us not just to reduce CO2 emissions but to enhance the overall sustainability (taking into account social, environment and economic factors) of the entire development.
2:15-3:00 WORKSHOP ‘FUTURE DIRECTIONS IN VISUALIZING BUILDING PERFORMANCE, Potentials and limitations. Facilitator: Dr. Neveen Hamza.