Conference Agenda

Overview and details of the sessions of this conference. Please select a date or location to show only sessions at that day or location. Please select a single session for detailed view (with abstracts and downloads if available).

 
Session Overview
Session
6PC/9: People & Community
Time:
Tuesday, 11/Dec/2018:
1:30pm - 3:30pm

Session Chair: Prof. Susanne Gampfer
Location: LT9
Lecture Theatre 9, 2/F, Yasumoto International Academic Park, CUHK

Presentations
1:30pm - 1:45pm

Earth, Density and Form

Neil Keith Burford1, Carol Robertson2

1Newcastle University, United Kingdom; 2University of Dundee

The driver behind the need for sustainable development is to mitigate the impact that predicted climate change will have on our cities, land uses and infrastructural systems. This paper explores new spatial forms of sustainable housing in Scotland where the demand for new housing in accessible rural areas is predicted to increase due to pressure from nearby urban centres. Historically, rural building forms were largely influenced by immediately available materials, climate and specific use, resulting in regionally identifiable typologies. However, changes in the way we live, proximity to place of work, and the relationship between home, community and land-use have resulted in rural domestic buildings losing specific regional distinctions. The primary house type on offer through the volume house building market is homogenised materially, structurally and spatially, lacking any relationship to place. The aim of this research was to generate new spatial models of autarkic housing and alternative massing arrangements that responded to land-use, density, energy, landscape and Scottish policy frameworks. The main objective in the study was to generate alternative, semi-quantifiable models that integrated the above requirements within holistic conceptual frameworks for rural sustainable living and which could then be used as a primer for further research and development.


1:45pm - 2:00pm

Impact of Urban Air Pollution on Occupants’ Visual Comfort, Alertness, Mood in an Office with Various Glazing Types

Xiaodong Chen1, Xin Zhang1, Jiangtao Du2

1Tsinghua University, China; 2Liverpool John Moores University, United Kingdom

Urban air pollution is currently one of the top worst pollution problems in China. It can not only worsen indoor air quality but also substantially reduce daylight availabilities in buildings, both of which are directly linked to occupants’ health and well-being. This article presents results of a winter experiment focusing on testing human performances in a daylit office room with three various glazing systems in Beijing. The impact of external air pollution on occupants’ visual comfort, alertness and mood is the research focus. Some findings can be achieved as 1) Urban air pollution can significantly reduce the indoor daylighting availability; 2) Urban air pollution would significantly affect occupants’ performances. 3) The impact varies with the applications of different window glazing systems. A proper selected glazing system could mitigate the negative impact of urban air pollution on human performances.


2:00pm - 2:15pm

Social Preference of Building Materials: Decision-Making Towards Low Carbon Housing Constructions

Rodrigo Alba Krasovsky1, Sebastian Bobadilla Suarez2, Dietrich Schwarz1

1Universität Liechtenstein; 2University College London

Material considerations are essential while trying to achieve low energy and carbon constructions. According to our preliminary findings, decisions regarding materials in new buildings are mostly done by clients or by self-builders often without the aid of an architect or planner. Therefore, community studies are important to understand today’s building dynamics. In this exploratory study - carried out in USA and Mexico - we analysed the public’s preferences for building materials for the exterior of dwellings and the factors that have more influence over their decisions while choosing the materials. We also studied the update in the subjects’ preference after receiving certain information concerning the materials. We wanted to know if the environmental factors play an important role in today's public preference in the building sector and what type of information could greater affect their beliefs. Preliminary results for Mexico and after a follow up analysis for USA show that acknowledging unfamiliar information (e.g. carbon emissions or price) might have a greater influence on the public’s update of preference of materials. This could have implications for the construction market dynamics in the usage promotion of low carbon building materials.


2:15pm - 2:30pm

The Impact of Facade Renovation Strategies on User Satisfaction in Offices, Case studies for summer in the Netherlands

Minyoung Kwon, Hilde Remøy, Ulrich Knaack

Delft University of Technology, The Netherlands

Many offices have been renovated to improve building performance. However, the user’s perception after renovation has not been evaluated. This paper presents user satisfaction with indoor environmental quality in façade renovated offices in the Netherlands. The study explored the correlation between facade renovation strategies and indoor climate on the one hand and on the other hand user satisfaction and user preferences. Data were collected in four renovated offices in the Netherlands, which were adapted using different façade renovation strategies. The case study consisted of conducting online surveys and indoor climate monitoring for 2 weeks with loggers. Statistical results demonstrate that design factors such as desk location, workplace orientation, and layout have a strong correlation with user satisfaction of IEQ, unlike window types. The suggested essential design factors for user satisfaction can guide architects and designers to better understand users’ preferences and to reflect on office design.


2:30pm - 2:45pm

Two Degree Rise In Indoor Temperature: Energy Use Behaviour Of British Asians

Satish B K

University of Plymouth, United Kingdom

The understanding of households’ socio-economic characteristics and their behaviour has been acknowledged as a key factor while assessing the energy demands. There is considerable research in the area of building simulation and energy modelling; However, the representation of occupants and their behaviour needs further work. For instance, every degree rise in internal temperature settings will increase the household energy consumption by 10 %. This research investigates the energy use behaviour of a specific demographic and ethnic group, the British Asian households. A large-scale housing survey is used to gather self-reported information about the British Asian households’ energy use behaviour, for instance, heating patterns, appliances use, ventilation behaviour, as well as other socio-economic characteristics. Data collected will be transformed into energy models, which includes Space heating behaviour models, electrical appliances and lighting use models, and Ventilation behaviour models. The outcome of this research demonstrates how social perception and economic aspirations limit the acceptability of sustainable design and construction strategies. This research involves active community participation and engagement; a major part of the dissemination will aim at communicating the research findings to the British Asian households, which will have a direct impact of energy reduction by informed behaviour choice.


2:45pm - 3:00pm

Analyze the Interaction between People’s Perceptions of Interior Spatial Properties and the Opening Form with Isovist Measures

Xufeng Zhang

Nanjing University, China, People's Republic of China

The opening form of building façade has a strong influence on people’s perceptions of interior spatial properties. However, architectural designers usually pay attention to aesthetics aspect of building façade and neglect the influence of changing the opening form on the people’s perceptions of interior space. Furthermore, the isovist is a quantitative method that describes space from a visual observing perspective including 2D and 3D measures. But most isovist studies investigate the visual experience of interior space only in two dimensions. Besides, the opening can also influent the daylighting performance, and the daylighting performance can impact the interior perception as well. In response, this paper presents the results of a study involving 52 participants who assessed 29 perspective views of virtual interiors with different opening forms for feelings of spaciousness. Firstly, these results are compared with isovist measures, including 2D and3D, to examine which isovist measure is more effective. Secondly, these results are compared with daylighting measures to find out which openings can possess both spacious feeling and nice daylighting performance.


3:00pm - 3:15pm

Occupant Satisfaction in 60 Radiant and All-air Buildings

Caroline Karmann1,2, Stefano Schiavon1, Lindsay Graham1, Paul Raftery1, Fred Bauman1

1UC Berkeley, Center for the Built Environment; 2ARUP, United Kingdom

Radiant heating and cooling systems have the potential to save energy and are widely used in zero net energy buildings. Their positive and negative impacts on indoor environmental quality and, in particular, thermal comfort compared to all-air systems are still debated in the literature. This paper presents indoor environmental quality survey results from 3,892 respondents in 60 office buildings located in North America. 34 (2,247 respondents) of these buildings utilized all-air systems and 26 (1,645 respondents) utilized radiant systems as primary conditioning system. Our results indicate that radiant and all-air buildings have equal indoor environmental quality, including acoustic performance, with a tendency towards improved temperature satisfaction in radiant buildings.