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

3 Energy Concept
Advanced Building Skins
In the basic considerations a building concept was sought, which creates an attractive living
environment that integrates the systems of energy supply without compromising comfort and
aesthetics. Only solar radiation should be used to provide the required amounts of electricity and
thermal energy. Three architectural designs were compared with each other. Selected was the
presented design concept, which is characterized in its outer contour of a familiar building geometry.
But on closer examination there are two completely different halves of the building, both in terms of
its function and structure. The northern half of the building consists of the living area, while on the
south side of the building a so called solar garden is located. Thus, the proposed building is divided
clearly into a passive and an active part.
Figure 3: Idea of collecting and storing solar energy
The passive northern residential area is designed to minimize energy losses of the building. This is
achieved by a highly insulating, airtight building envelope with a high effective thermal storage
capacity of the components. To ensure a sufficient supply of daylight it is provided with daylightoptimized
windows with triple glazing.
Figure 4: Energy concept under winter (left) and summer (right) conditions
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