Energy consumption of atria; the case of a commercial-office center in the semi-arid climate of Tehran

Document Type : Research Paper

Authors

1 Department of Architecture, West Tehran Branch, Islamic Azad University West Tehran Branch,Tehran,Iran

2 Department of Architecture, Islamic Azad University, Damavand branch, Damavand, Iran

Abstract

According to the energy crisis in the world, optimization of energy consumption is indispensable. Technological advances in constructions and application of renewable energy resources demand saving energy. Atrium, as one of the construction elements, catches sufficient daylight and acts as a passive solar element and results in a decline of energy consumption.
This research seeks to evaluate the impact of different positions of atrium on its energy performance; this embraces modelling three groups of spatial configuration of atriums in a given four-story building. The total volume and area of atriums in all three groups are equal. DesignBuilder, the energy simulation software, is the platform for simulation and comparison.
The results show that the number of atriums does not have a noticeable impact on energy consumption; however, the spatial configuration of atriums, specially the distance of atriums to external walls have a little impact on the annual energy consumption. Based on the purpose of a specific design, one can decide on whether to take into account the discrepancy.

Keywords

References

[1] Aldawoud A., The influence of the atrium geometry on the building energy performance, Energy and Buildings (2013) 57: 1-5.
[2] Alzoubi H.H., Al-Zoubi A.H., Assessment of building façade performance in terms of daylighting and the associated energy consumption in architectural spaces: Vertical and horizontal shading devices for southern exposure facades, Energy Conversion and Management (2010) 51(8): 1592-1599.
[3] Cantin F., Dubois M.-C., Daylighting metrics based on illuminance, distribution, glare and directivity, Lighting Research & Technology (2011) 43(3): 291-307.
[4] Lim Y.-W., et al., Empirical validation of daylight simulation tool with physical model measurement, American Journal of Applied Sciences (2010) 7(10): 1426.
[5] Rundle  C., et al., Validation of computational fluid dynamics simulations for atria geometries, Building and Environment (2011) 46(7): 1343-1353.
[6] Göçer Ö., et al., Thermal performance simulation of an atrium building, in Proceedings of eSim building performance simulation conference, Faculty of architecture, landscape, and design, University of Toronto, Canada (2006).
[7] Hussain S., et al., Evaluation of various turbulence models for the prediction of the airflow and temperature distributions in atria,Energy, and Buildings (2012) 48: 18-28.
[8] Nasrollahi N., et al., Appropriate Geometrical Ratio Modeling of Atrium for Energy Efficiency in Office Buildings, Journal of Building Performance (2015) 6(1).
[9] Liu P., et al., Evaluation of buoyancy-driven ventilation in atrium buildings using computational fluid dynamics and reduced-scale air model, Building and Environment (2009) 44(9): 1970-1979.
[10] Assadi M.K., et al., Analytical model of atrium for heating and ventilating an institutional building naturally, Energy and Buildings (2011) 43(10): 2595-2601.
[11] Fini  A.S., Moosavi A., Effects of “wall angularity of atrium” on “buildings natural ventilation and thermal performance” and CFD model, Energy and Buildings (2016) 121: 265-283.
[12] Erlendsson Ö., Daylight optimization: A parametric study of atrium design, Y. Lisans Tezi. School of Architecture and the Built Environment, Stockholm (2014).
[13] Ghasemi M., et al., The influence of well geometry on the daylight performance of atrium adjoining spaces: A parametric study, Journal of Building Engineering (2015) 3: 39-47.
[14] Doheim  R., et al., The impact of atrium shape on natural smoke ventilation, Fire safety journal (2014) 63: 9-16.
[15] Mohsenin  M., Hu J., Assessing daylight performance in atrium buildings by using Climate Based Daylight Modeling, Solar Energy (2015) 119: 553-560.
[16] Du J., Sharples S., Daylight in atrium buildings: Geometric shape and vertical sky components, Lighting Research & Technology (2010) 42(4): 385-397.
[17] Tabesh T., Sertyesilisik B., An investigation into energy performance with the integrated usage of a courtyard and atrium, Buildings (2016) 6(2): 21.
[18] Radhi  H., On the optimal selection of wall cladding system to reduce direct and indirect CO2 emissions, Energy (2010) 35(3): 1412-1424.
[19] Lymath, A. (2015, February 01). What is a U-value? Heat loss, thermal mass and online calculators explained. Retrieved from https://www.thenbs.com/knowledge/what-is-a-u-value-heat-loss-thermal-mass-and-online-calculators-explained
[20] Ghiabaklou, Z, Fundamentals of building physics 5: Daylighting (2013) 88, ISBN 978-964-210-167-2, Jihad Amirkabir University.
Energy Equipment and Systems
Volume 7, Issue 3 - Serial Number 3
September 2019
Pages 211-234

Files

Share

How to cite

Statistics