advanced building skins 14 | 15 June 2012 - lamp.tugraz.at - Graz ...

1 Introduction
Advanced Building Skins
The energy transformation through the building envelope is a key topic in the planning of Energy-
Plus-houses. Therefore the façade can be understood both as an energy barrier as well as an energy
collector and converter. Besides the classic functions of the building skin, such as the protection
against weather conditions a major challenge lies in the energy management. In addition to the energy
efficiency, the essential function of the building as a living space has to be treated on an equal footing
in the design concept.
To meet these very ambitious and fascinating challenges an intensive interdisciplinary dialogue is
essential among all participants in the planning process. Architects and specialist planners for
structural design, building physics, building service technology and energy supply work together on a
coherent overall concept, which fulfills the basic idea of the positive-energy building with regard to
room conditioning, hot water supply, lighting and operation of electrical appliances as well as the
requirements of the comfort of the living space.
Due to the recent development of electric mobility the synergistic interface between mobility and
property is a challenge in the future. Thus there is a need to coordinate the field of construction and
automotive sector to generate a holistic energy concept. In the following proposed draft, which is the
result of an interdisciplinary team project at the Technische Universität Darmstadt, this interaction
between different disciplines and the resulting interfaces is shown by the example of the building skin.
The team developed a concept for the building envelope, that represents an equal consideration of the
competing goals of energy, resource efficiency and living space. For the integration of electric
mobility a possible interface to the building service is shown. Finally, general approaches are
discussed, how to consider multifunctional facade systems in an economic evaluation.
2 Architectural Concept - the Introduction of an In-between Space
Could it be that the widespread use of electricity driven cars will change our attitudes towards
automobiles? Will it bring about a change in the status we attribute to cars and what consequences will
result for their positioning and functioning inside buildings?
Maybe the car of our future will be one among many other means of transportation such as scooters,
electric bikes and bobby cars. Quite contrary to conventional automobiles electric cars are relatively
clean vehicles that are more comparable to a trolley or a bike. So we were questioning ourselves if it
still aquires a space monopolized by it.
Figure 1: Visualization of the architectural concept
- 2 -