Accurate building physics performance analysis requires time-consuming, detailed modeling, and calculation time requirement. This paper evaluates the impact of model simplifications on thermal and visual comfort as well as energy performance. In the framework of dynamic zonal thermal simulation, a case study of a residential building in hot climate is investigated. A detailed model is created and simplified through four scenarios, by incrementally reducing the number of thermal zones from modeling every space as a separate zone to modeling the building as a single zone. The differences of total energy and comfort performance in the detailed and simplified models are analyzed to evaluate the grade of the simplifications’ accuracy. The results indicate that all simplification scenarios present a marginal average deviation in total energy demand and thermal comfort by less than 20%. Combining rooms with similar thermal features into a zone presents the optimal scenario, while the worst scenario is the single-zone model. Results showed that thermal zone merging as a simulation simplification method has its limitations as well, whereas a too intensive simplification can lead to undesired error rates. The method is well applicable in further early-stage design and development tasks, specifically in large-scale projects.

The energy consumption of residential buildings represents the majority part of energy usage in Egypt. The aim of this study is to assess the energy performance of a dwelling in New Minia City, Egypt through different orientations. The energy consumption of the case study building is 52560 kWh annually. However, this energy demand could be reduced by 5.8% if the building is oriented to the north direction. The difference of the energy consumption between the best and the worst building orientations, North and South, respectively, reached up to 7.5%. The location of the actual building has a noticeable effect on the energy consumption.

Day-lighting studies in buildings play a major role in indoor environmental investigation and can be conducted at the early stages of building design. Window position significantly affects day-lighting performance. This paper assessed the impacts of the window position on the visual comfort through two main factors; daylight factor and light uniformity in the hot and dry climate zone. In this study different window positions have been examined to achieve optimal visual comfort, using a dynamic simulation through Vi-suit plugin for Blender 3D software that controls the external application Radiance software. The results revealed that the window position at sill start from 1.4 m of a room characterized by (4.30 m × 3.00 m × 3.00 m) is the best compromising solution that complies with the daylight factor and light uniformity standards in the indoor environment. The findings of this study provide a more detailed and comprehensive analysis of the window design for architects/designers in the early building design stages in the hot and dry climate region.

The number of migrants increases globally due to natural disasters, global warming, and war conflicts. Inefficient and unsustainable construction approaches for migrant shelters have resulted from improper planning and design systems regarding lifespan, materials and techniques, and socio-cultural aspects. Therefore, the study aim has an incentive to assess the impact of the morphological, siting, and layout of zones and shelters for the long-term displacement prototypes considering sustainability concepts from social context, affordability, adaptability, low-impact construction materials, and techniques. Furthermore, applying the dynamic simulation IDA ICE 4.8 tool was cardinal to justify the comprehensive reported outcomes based on the bottom-up construction method after assessing energy and thermal comfort performance in seven cases. The energy performance assessment regarding heating reveals the superiority of the compact layout plan system, while the open-layout plan system is superior for electric cooling assessment. Concerning thermal comfort performance for the number of accepted hours category, the open-layout plan system is superior. Fanger indicators for thermal comfort assessment demonstrated the superiority of the horizontal-compact layout plan scheme. The carbon dioxide (CO₂) concentration level assessment shows that the open-yard layout cases have better results than other systems. To conclude, sustainable prototypes for displaced people should involve several aspects such as lifespan, socio-cultural and affordability, thermal performance and energy-efficient, and environmental impact. The beneficiaries from the methods and the results of this study would be firstly the Syrian refugees in the Middle East context, then various places and involved people affected by the displacement issue globally.

This paper proposes the application of energy efficient, low tech (passive) building design strategies and concepts in an industrial facility case study, in order to create a building with high efficiency and comfort within the boundaries of a tight investment cost. The planning process is supported by dynamic thermal and daylight simulations. Two versions were considered, a conventional industry building and a low tech one with climate zone based space organization. According to the evaluation of thermal and visual comfort as well as energy demand the selected version with the innovative passive concept delivered considerably better performance. According to the constructor’s concept, the reference building had to be placed by minimal adaptation on the new site. After considering and calling this concept into question, a new ‘energy design’ concept was elaborated at the sketch planning level. The new concept was compared with the reference building and a quantified, simulation assisted evaluation was provided about the cases. Since there was an essential improvement in comfort and energy level and, in addition, at architectural standard, the constructor could have been convinced to accept the new concept.