A comprehensive model for streamlining low-energy building design

Abstract

Building designers are often limited in their ability to reduce the environmental impact of buildings, due to a lack of information on the environmental performance of building components as well as inconsistencies in the way in which this information is derived. Whilst numerous tools exist to help facilitate the low-energy building design process, these typically require large investments of time and money that are often beyond those available within any particular project. This paper describes an approach for streamlining the design process to reduce building life cycle energy consumption. Building assemblies are ranked based on an assessment of the life cycle energy requirements associate..