KIEAE Journal

Korea Institute of Ecological Architecture and Environment (한국생태환경건축학회)
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A Study on Passive Cooling Strategies for Buildings in Hot Humid Region of Nepal

  • Manandhar, Rashmi (Dept. of Architectural Engineering, Hanbat National Univ.) ;
  • Yoon, Jongho (Dept. of Architectural Engineering, Hanbat National Univ.)
  • Received : 2014.05.03
  • Accepted : 2014.06.20
  • Published : 2015.02.28
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Abstract

Increase in energy consumption in building is a big concern world over. In Nepal, energy crisis is a big issue but energy demand in buildings is barely even thought about. In the southern part of Nepal, where the weather is mostly hot during the year, cooling in buildings is very important. This is an initial study regarding building design strategies which focuses on cooling energy consumption in the building. It can be seen from the study that simple passive strategies can be applied in building design which can support in decreasing cooling load. Different passive cooling strategies like orientation, building size, thermal mass, window design and two direct cooling strategies have been investigated in this study. Direct cooling strategies like shading and natural cooling helps in passive cooling. Different desing strategies have different impact on the cooling energy requirement and the study shows that thermo physical property of building materials has the maximum effect on the energy consumption of the building. Each design strategy creates and average of 20% decrease in energy consumption, whereas the thermal conductivity can have as much as 10 times more effect on the energy consumption than other design strategies.

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References

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