Bio-climatic Design Strategies for Buildings in Delhi, India

Abstract— Building sector plays a vital role towards energy efficiency and energy conservation. In India, building sector accounts almost 35% of the country’s energy consumption. Building sector has been growing rapidly and is expected to increase five folds from 2005 to 2030. This rapid growth presents  a challenge as well as an opportunity to design energy efficient buildings and to conserve energy for sustainable development. Energy usage in buildings has been increasing with climate change. Bioclimatic design has enormous potential in minimizing energy usage in buildings and minimizing carbon dioxide emissions. New Delhi being the capital city has witnessed tremendous building construction activities in and around the city. This paper focuses on various bioclimatic design strategies for building design in a composite climate like Delhi. Number of factors which affects thermal comforts i.e. temperature, humidity, rainfall, wind etc has been analyzed to arrive at performance specifications. To address the seasonal requirements which are often contradictory in composite climate, a weighing system, known as Mahoney Table has been used to assess the relative importance of conflicting requirements. The objective of the study is to devise different characteristics of architectural components i.e. layout of the building, spacing, air movement, size of the openings, position of openings, protection of openings, thermal capacity and insulation of walls, roofs and external features of buildings in Delhi.

Keywords— Bio-climatic design, Thermal comfort, Energy Efficiency, Sustainable development, Mahoney Table

I. INTRODUCTION

Building sector plays a vital role towards energy efficiency and energy conservation. Due to rapid urbanization and
population growth, India has tremendous opportunity in building sector which presently accounts almost 35% of the
country’s energy consumption. Building sector has been growing rapidly and is expected to increase overall constructed area approximately five folds from 21 billion square feet in 2005 to 104 billion square feet by 2030. This is a challenge as well as an opportunity for the building sector in India. As the building sector will grow, the amount of greenhouse gases emissions will also be more.

Read Full Length Paper