In developing my building envelopes, I considered the thermal resistance of my walls, roof, and glazing systems. I added glazing features to the southern walls to encourage passive solar and added an overhang to also provide shading in the summer months. I made a terrace inspired by Y2E2’s design to encourage people to go outside. I have been unable to load curtain systems such as skylights and doors onto my computer, but I will add them when analyzing how infiltration occurs. I created a green roof that as of right now just shows the locations of plant boxes, but I would like to add different types of plants. This image shows the entrance to the museum:
I used multi stud walls for the solid features that have an R value of 66 hr-ft2-F/Btu. I used a roof with an R value of 58 hr-ft2-F/Btu to insulate the roof. My curtain features have less thermal resistance in an effort to increase the amount of light that is passing through the building. The greenhouse exhibit similarly has glazing walls, but I added overhangs so people will be inclined to pass through the garden features and to this exhibit. This image shows the back of the site which has the kid’s space and the greenhouse.
As for the position of the sun, I made sure that the building is oriented along an east and west plane with the south facing glazing features. The main problem that I am running into is not having enough lighting features within the first and second floor hallways, but sky lights seemed to fix this issue. This image shows the angles of the sun in the winter:
Using Insight solar analysis, I then diagramed the sunlight that will pass through year round. It seems that I can take advantage of the south side facing walls. This image shows the solar diagram year round:
I used the Solar Analysis tool in Revit to generate a diagram of the solar potential. There is a lot of potential solar to take advantage of, so I will wait for next week’s recommendations to decide if I should stick to more skylights or use the roof for solar PV generation. I am currently a bit undecided so I have the model without skylights here and the model with skylights at the end. This image also highlights the green roof system I will be using:
Using Insight Energy Analysis: I found that my initial envelopes meet the ASHRAE 90.1 standards, but they do not meet Architecture 2030 standards. Additionally, I used Insight to analyze what I could change to meet my goals of Zero Net Energy usage, and found that HVAC systems efficiency will have a large impact on reaching my goals. In order to reach HVAC systems standards, I will need to take into account infiltration values for my location of Stanford, CA. I will also need to make sure that I do not have too much heating to the point where my building now gets too hot and has to use air conditioning to cool. Here is a screenshot of my initial values:
Using the lighting analysis in Revit, I found that I was having issues with providing enough lighting on the hallways of the first and second floor. I created a model with a skylight to fix this issue, but I am unsure if I will keep that feature if enough heating is already being provided and if not using the skylight allows for more solar PV. I definitely also plan to expand my green roof system to reach my goal of maximizing overall green area of my design. This picture shows the areas that currently lack natural night form the sun:
I then added room for a skylight in my design to account for the results of running the lighting analysis which showed that I should include an atrium or skylight to allow more lighting into the building. I am unsure if this will stick once I add solar installations, but I wanted to model it as a potential option. This image shows where the skylight would be present (I was having trouble creating a curtain system in Revit because I am unable to load the family):
My other sustainability goal is to decrease the number of SOV trips to the site, so I will be adding a path that leads to the store front entrance.