Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) can play an important role in building design. For all aspects and stages of building design, CFD can be used to provide more accurate and rapid predictions of building performance with regard to air flow, pressure, temperature, and similar parameters. Generally, the process involved in conducting CFD analyses is relatively complex and requires a good understanding of how best to utilize computational numerical methods. Moreover, the level of skill required to perform an accurate CFD analysis remains a challenge for many professionals particularly architects. In addition, the user needs to input a number of different items of information and parameters into the CFD program in order to obtain a successful and credible solution. This research seeks to improve the general understanding of how CFD can best be used as a design assistance tool. While there have been a number of quantitative studies suggesting CFD may be a useful tool for building related airflow assessment, few researchers have explored the more qualitative aspects of CFD, in particular developing a better understanding of the procedures required for the proper application of CFD to whole building analysis. This study therefore adopted a combined qualitative and quantitative methodology, with the researcher immersing himself into a case study approach and defining several lessons-learned that are documented and shared. This research will assist practicing architects and architecture students to better understand the application of CFD to building analysis and design. / Ph. D.

A safe school is defined as a physically and emotionally safe environment where faculty and staff, members of the community, and students perceive that they are safe. School safety is an important topic for both school administrators and architects who design schools. Previous research into the physical environment of a school has explored its impact on student achievement and, to a lesser extent, school climate and school safety. Overall, research into the relationship between a physical environment of a school and its influence on the perception of safety is inadequate. The study sought to determine what were the design elements that principals and architects believed promoted a safe elementary school. The main research question for the study was, "What are the design elements that principals and architects believe influence a safe elementary school?" The study replicated the methodology of Walton's study (2011) called Physical Design for Safe Schools. Walton focused on perceptions of high school principals and architects who were involved in designing and building schools. Walton's study concluded that safety was an important issue to principals and architects. Specifically, each group identified supervision, technology and cameras, and controlling access to school buildings as important to school safety. The groups also identified restrooms and locker rooms as the two most problematic areas of a school building due to inability to supervise. Data for the study were gathered through qualitative methods and utilized a phenomenological approach to exploring data. Principals from elementary schools built before 1999, principals from elementary schools built since 2011, and architects with experience designing elementary schools were included as participants in the study. Participants were asked five to nine semi-structured and open-ended questions relevant to the design elements and physical features associated with school buildings. Results of the study found that the physical design of a school building was viewed as having an influence on safety in schools. The two common themes from all three groups were access control and visibility. Sub-themes were the importance of preparation for emergencies, perceptions of inequality in funding for school safety measures, the prevalence of technology that has created greater opportunities to keep schools safe, and the need for balance between safety and aesthetics when designing schools. / Ed. D.

This thesis project is a developing office building, designed for a start-up company. One character of the company is that its main projects serve China, but there are also few local projects. The main goal of this architecture is to provide a convenient and changeable place for this start-up company. There are a few disciplines during design process: 1. The building has a round shape and blocks add on when it grows. 2. In the middle of the building, it is a fixed courtyard which covered by skylight. 3. The blocks are in modules and the rooms function can be changed as needed. 4. The roof at the early stage of this architecture can be used as floors in the future. The site is located in the suburban area of Washington DC, which next to the Rock Creek Park. Surrounding buildings mostly are traditional residential architectures,with sloping roof and brick walls.This site is only 3 blocks away from the main street. Therefore, the site can provide an urban context which means clients and employees can easily get into. But people do not need to afford too high price for the land. What's more, people can enjoy a pretty view while working. The building has the steel frame as the primary structure and concrete covering for the floor slab. For the elevation, the adjustable wood panel and curtain walls are used to balance with local sun orientation. / Master of Architecture

The building industry makes up a considerable fraction of world&amp / #8217 / s energy consumption. The adverse effects of a growing energy demand such as depletion in fossil fuel reserves and natural resources hassled the building industry to a search for new technologies that result in less energy consumption together with the maximum utilization of natural resources. Energy- and ecology-conscious European countries incorporated the well-being of occupants while conducting research on innovative technologies. In view of the fact that double-skin fa&ccedil / ades offer a healthy and comfortable milieu for the occupants and use natural resources hence consume less energy they became a promising invention for all concerns. The analysis of the performance of the double-skin fa&ccedil / ades and energy consumption is inconclusive at this time. However, based upon thermal performance analysis have been done so far, a double-skin fa&ccedil / ade perform better and provide some energy reduction, particularly on the heating side cycle, from a standard double glazed unit wall. The aim of this study was to examine the relationship between double-skin fa&ccedil / ades and building management systems in intelligent office buildings as they relate to energy efficiency issues thus to find out whether or not the integration of these systems into intelligent buildings provides optimization in energy performance and comfort conditions. The building for the case study, which is an intelligent office building incorporating a double-skin fa&ccedil / ade was selected as one that promises high comfort conditions for the occupants with low energy consumption. The working principles of integrated fa&ccedil / ade systems, together with their advantages and disadvantages were investigated by means of the case study. It was concluded that due to their high initial costs, these systems offer no real advantages for today. However with the inevitable exhaustion of fossil fuels that is foreseen for the future, these systems would become an innovative solution in terms of energy conservation.

Projektuojama gamykla skirta medinių skydinių namų gamybai Balsiškių km. Kretingos rajone. Šie mediniai namai skirti gyventi ir jie yra taupūs energijos atžvilgiu. Projektuojama gamykla - tai gamybinis pastatas 34 x 65,7 m, bei administracinės patalpos (ofisas) 7,8 x 11,9 m. Darbe aptariame kokios medžiagos ir konstrukcijos naudojamos energiją taupančių namų gamyboje, bei detaliai pateikiama šių namų gamybos technologiją. Gamybinis pastato pagrindinės konstrukcijos – gelžbetoninės kolonos, kas 4500 mm. Tarpai užpildyti vata apšiltintas metalinis karkasas, apdaila – profiliuoti skardos lakštai. Stogo konstrukcija – medinės santvaros, stogo danda – prilydoma bituminė Midos stogo danga. Administracinio pastato pagrindinės konstukcijos – pirmo aukšto sienos mūrinės iš silikatinių blokelių apšiltintos iš lauko pusės izoliuojančia medžiaga. Lauko apdaila – tinkas. Antro aukšto sienos – dviguba rąstinė siena, izoliuota 150 mm vata. Perdanga – nepertraukiamo formavimo perdangos plokštės 250 mm storio bei iš viršaus apšiltinta vata. Stogo konstrukcija – medinės gegnės. Stogas izoliuotas 25 cm. Stogo danga – molinės čerpės. Darbo pagrindinis tikslas – apskaičiuoti konstrukcijas ir patikrinti ar pasirinktos konstrukcijos tenkina saugos ir tinkamumo ribinius būvius. Projektuojame gamyklos pastatams šildymo sistemas. Detaliau aptariame gamyklos pastatų statybos technologijas, sudaromas kalendorinis darbų atlikimo grafikas. Atlikus visus projektavimo ir planavimo darbus, pateikiama... [toliau žr. visą tekstą] / We are projecting factory buildings for production of element wooden houses in Balsiškiai, Kretinga district. Produced wooden houses will be used for living and they will be energy saving. Factory buildings consists of production building is 34 x 65,7 m and administration building (office) 7,8 x 11,9 m. In this work we describe what materials and constructions could be used for energy saving houses‘production and in detail overview technology of production of such houses. Main constructions of production building are ferroconcrete pillars each 4500mm. Gaps between these pillars will be insulated metal frame covered with profiled steel plates. Roof constructions will be wooden frames; roof cladding will be two layers bitumen roof Mida Main constructions for office building in first floor will be brick walls from silicate blocks, insulated from outside. Outside finishing will be puts. For second floor walls will be double, made from double logs and insulated between with 150 mm insulation. Ceiling construction will be continuous formation ferroconcrete plate 250 mm height and from top it will be insulated with mineral wool. Roof constructions will be wooden rafters with 25 cm insulation and covered with tiles from clay. Main purpose of this job is calculated all constructions and check that all chosen constructions are strong enough according to safety and suitability limit conditions. At the same time we are making calculations for heating systems. In details we describe... [to full text]

Empreendimentos hospitalares são reconhecidos pela complexidade que está associada a todas as fases de seu ciclo de vida: projeto, construção e operação. Os projetos da saúde são altamente influenciados por regulamentações locais. Estes conjuntos de códigos e legislações contém informações prescritivas e são importantes ao projeto, uma vez que as especificações são, usualmente, definidas de acordo com os critérios neles contidos. Ao longo do processo de desenvolvimento de produto, as especificações devem ser verificadas frente aos requisitos extraídos destas regulamentações. Este processo, se realizado manualmente, tende a ser demorado e propenso a erros. Tentativas de desenvolvimento de sistemas de verificação automatizada não se mostraram completamente satisfatórias. Muitos dos problemas estão relacionados à forma como novas abordagens são concebidas, muitas vezes desenvolvidas de acordo com métodos codificados e fragmentados, e à tipologia de informação que está nas normas e regulamentações. A abordagem metodológica utilizada nesta pesquisa foi a Design Science Research. Como artefato, foi desenvolvido um framework com base na abordagem semântica, para fornecer suporte ao desenvolvimento de sistemas de verificação automatizada, com ênfase em requisitos regulamentares no contexto de projetos de edificações hospitalares. As principais contribuições teóricas deste estudo, portanto, estão relacionadas às taxonomias e às transformações da informação, bem como às relações entre os constructos utilizados. Os resultados indicam que a natureza das regulamentações possui impacto significativo na possibilidade de tradução em regra lógica parametrizável. Apesar de a automação ser desejável, os resultados deste estudo indicam, ainda, que atualmente nem todos os requisitos podem ser completamente traduzidos em termos de processamento e verificação automatizados. Apesar de este fato diminuir o nível geral de automatização no processo, ele pode trazer benefícios ao contexto de projetos da saúde. O atendimento de alguns dos requisitos depende em um certo grau, em critérios subjetivos, que estão relacionados à interpretação humana e à criatividade. / Healthcare facilities are recognized for the complexity associated to all phases of their lifecycle: design, construction and operation. The design of healthcare projects is highly influenced by local healthcare regulations. These legislations usually contain prescriptive information and play an important role, as design specifications should be defined based on the criteria defined therein. In the design phase, during the product development process, requirements extracted from legal regulations must be verified against design specifications. This process, if done manually, tends to be time consuming and error prone. Attempts to develop automated rule checking systems for healthcare projects have not been fully successful. Most flaws appear to be related to the way new approaches are conceived, being mostly developed according to hard-coded and fragmented approaches, and the typology of information bounded by the regulations. The methodological approach adopted in this investigation was the Design Science Research. The main outcome of this research study is a semantic-based framework, devised to support the development of automated rule checking systems, focused on regulatory requirements of healthcare building design. The main theoretical contributions of this research work are concerned with the taxonomies and information transformation, as well as the relationships among the constructs involved. The results indicate that the nature of regulations have a major impact on the possibility of translating them into logic rules. Even though automation is desirable, the findings of this study also indicate that currently not all requirements can be fully translated into rules for automated processing and checking. Although this decreases the overall degree of automation in the process, this fact may provide benefits to the healthcare context. The fulfillment of some requirements to some extend should rely on subjective criteria, which depends on human interpretation and creativity.

Devido a fatores como o longo tempo de desenvolvimento e a elevada quantidade de clientes envolvidos, existem dificuldades para realizar a gestão dos requisitos dos clientes do processo de projeto de ambientes construídos. Na busca por alternativas para solucionar tais dificuldades, esta pesquisa explora conceitos e práticas de Gestão de Requisitos (GR) provenientes de outras áreas de conhecimento, em especial da engenharia de software (ES). O objetivo da pesquisa é apresentar diretrizes para integrar a GR ao processo de projeto, tendo em vista contribuir com o acompanhamento da evolução e no controle dos requisitos dos clientes. Uma versão preliminar das diretrizes foi desenvolvida com base na revisão bibliográfica e nos resultados de um estudo de caso exploratório. Posteriormente, as mesmas foram aplicadas com ênfase nos requisitos ambientais identificados em um segundo estudo de caso, o qual permitiu o refinamento e a proposta final das diretrizes. Tais diretrizes são formadas por duas premissas e nove atividades. As premissas são condicionantes a serem atendidos pelas empresas para a realização das atividades da GR. As atividades, por sua vez, são desdobramentos das quatro etapas da GR (identificação de requisitos, análise e priorização, especificação e validação) e repetem-se ciclicamente ao longo das fases do processo de projeto, podendo ser implantadas com o apoio de boas práticas. Embora as diretrizes sejam aplicáveis à gestão de quaisquer tipos de requisitos, existem particularidades intrínsecas na gestão de cada tipo (sociais, econômicos e ambientais, por exemplo). No caso desta pesquisa, foi enfatizada a investigação das peculiaridades referentes aos requisitos ambientais identificados no empreendimento do segundo estudo de caso. A principal contribuição teórica desta pesquisa é a proposta de diretrizes para a GR suficientemente generalizáveis para aplicação em diferentes modelos de processo de projeto e diferentes tipos de requisitos. Do ponto de vista prático, os resultados evidenciaram que as diretrizes contribuem para a gestão sistemática dos requisitos, uma atividade que é normalmente realizada de modo informal no processo de projeto. / Long development period and a high number of stakeholders with different demands consist in some of the majors difficulties to be managed along the building design process. This research explores the Requirements Management (RM) concepts and practices from areas as software engineering as an alternative to solve some managerial problems. The aim is to present guidelines to integrate RM in the building design process, viewing the improvement of requirements traceability and control. The guidelines draft was based on literature review and on the results of an exploratory case study. Afterwards the guidelines draft was tested through a second case study, with emphasis on the project environmental requirements. This application promoted the guidelines improvement into their final configuration. The guidelines are based on two premises and nine activities. Premises are conditions which should be accomplished before the activities implementation. The activities are refinements of the four RM steps (requirements elicitation, analysis and prioritization, specification and validation) and they should be cyclically performed through the design process, using adequate good practices. Although guidelines may be useful to the management of any type of requirements, there are particular features to manage each of them (e. g. social, economical environmental). In this research, environmental requirements from the main case study were emphasized. The main theoretical contribution of this research is the proposition of guidelines which are generic enough to be performed through different design process models and different types of requirements. From a practical standpoint, the results indicated that the guidelines have contributed to the systematic RM in design process, an activity that is often informally performed in design process.

Accommodating the continued increase in energy demand in the face of global climate change has been a worldwide concern. With buildings in the US consuming nearly 40% of national energy, a concerted effort must be given to reduce building energy consumption. As new buildings continue to improve their efficiency through more restrictive energy codes, the other 76.9 billion square feet of current building stock falls further behind. The rate at which current buildings are being retrofit is not enough and better tools are needed to access the benefits of retrofits and the uncertainties associated with them. This study proposes a stochastic method of building energy model calibration coupled with a monthly normative building simulation addressed in ISO 13890. This approach takes advantage of the great efficiency of Latin Hypercube Sampling and the lightweight normative building simulation method, to deliver a set of calibrated solutions to assess the effectiveness of energy conservation measure, making uncertainty a part of the modeling process. A case study on a mixed-use university building is conducted to show the strength and performance of this simple method. Limitations and future concerns are also addressed.

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<p>The EN Eurocodes are a new series of standards for construction design in Europe. The development of these codes started originally in 1975 and in present time the progressing work is at the national calibration stage. The goal is to create a common standard for the design of buildings and other civil engineering works throughout Europe and beyond. The purpose is to increase the free circulation of construction products and engineering services. Since the transition to the new standards is getting closer, the constructing engineers and companies will soon stand before great changes. This is why Kadesjös Ingenjörsbyrå AB asked me to do an analysis of the first part of the new standard, i.e. Eurocode 1990, and look at the differences among the existing standards in Sweden and the Eurocodes. The result of this is summarized not only in the report but also in a “User’s manual” which is presented in appendix 1 attached to the report. A limited study of the environmental effects of the transition to Eurocode EN 1990 has also been done. By comparing design calculations of a normal beam in three different materials, steel, concrete and glued laminated timber, one can, for instance, get a general view of how the differences of the two standards affect the required quantity of material. To get an insight of the different opinions that might exist concerning the new standard, a survey based on interviews of a few constructional engineers has been done. There was also discussed if any, and in that case what kind of preparations constructors and design companies are performing to be well prepared when the transition comes.</p>