Eco House of the Future preview
BlueGreen engineering (BGe), a recently formed company, specialises in sustainable building design and project management. The company strongly believes in innovation promoted by design that encompasses original ideas; ideas that indeed add value.
BGe’s idea of sustainable building design is unique but simple: a design that reduces construction time, but which also contains many sustainability features and is cost effective. Cost savings made from reduced construction time can be used for investment in a variety of sustainability features. Such features not only add to the bio-climatic nature of the building, but also reduce operating costs. Thus, using cost savings in this way makes sustainable building less expensive.
The BGe design that we submitted this year for the first time for the ‘Eco House of the Future’ competition is a small to medium scale multi-dwelling development. It is based on an innovative modular construction system that uses recycled construction materials. The construction system allows a dramatic reduction of construction time compared to conventional construction systems. It is estimated that the bulk of the construction for a 5 or 6 dwelling development can be completed in a matter of days.
The design also makes extensive use of passive design features, such as natural ventilation, optimal orientation and shading and daylight design. These features play an important role in reducing energy consumption for heating and cooling.
In particular, optimal shading design and building orientation allow penetration of direct sunlight during winter, but not in summer. At the same time, building orientation and shading design are designed so that the thermal mass of the interior of the home utilises the winter sun.
This stores heat during the day and this heat load is then re-emitted during the night. The design includes another innovative passive design feature that we will be revealing during the GreenTech exhibition.
Moreover, the large openable north facing and south facing windows included in the design induce cross flow ventilation, which is particularly useful during hot days. It is envisaged that the building will not require any conventional heating or cooling systems. Likewise, optimal daylight design ensures that there will be no need to switch on the lights during the day.
In terms of environmental benefits, we have designed a number of energy efficient features that make it possible for a small grid connected PV (photovoltaic system) to produce the equivalent energy amount consumed annually. Therefore, the design is Carbon Neutral.
The BGe design exhibits also many interesting water saving and recycling features: a low maintenance black water recycling system; storm and rainwater harvesting systems; and water efficient fixtures.
A number of other sustainability features in our design will be revealed during the GreenTECH show. We believe that the show is a great opportunity for companies and organisations to demonstrate sustainable products, services and ideas; and a challenging way to bring forward to wider audience alternative ideas about sustainability.
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