Energy and economic impact of the new Dubai municipality green building regulations and potential upgrades of the regulations
Date
2019
Authors
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Elsevier
Abstract
Dubai government has shown great interest in integrating sustainable principles into the different phases of
construction. In 2011, the Green Buildings Regulations and Specification (GBRS) were issued to form a market
shift toward a Green Economy for Sustainable Development. This research is to evaluate the effectiveness of the
different building regulations in effect in Dubai, as well as assessing the benefits of raising the bar to the
PassivHaus (PH) standards. The thermal impact of the building envelope on the energy performance and cooling
load reduction are the core focus of this study. Hence, a case study villa in Jumeirah Park was selected to be
analyzed, modified and simulated using the IESVE energy modeling software. The impact of each building
envelope element was assessed individually based on current Dubai regulations, as well as the PH specifications.
Cooling load savings of 5.9%, 8.67%, 1.55%, 11% and 20% were achieved when using the new Dubai GBRS
glazing, roof, floor, green roof specifications and the best combination of all three elements, respectively.
Upgrading the design to the PH specifications resulted in a 48% reduction in the cooling load. The addition of
Monocrystalline and Thin Film PV systems reduced the electricity consumption from the grid by 73% and 57%,
respectively. Enhancing HVAC efficiency was also identified as a potential approach to save on the electricity
used to provide the required cooling load, around 30% reduction when increasing the HVAC′ EER from the
minimum current value of 8.53–12.2 (at T1 conditions). The economic analysis showed that the only viable
solutions, based on simple payback period analysis, are upgrades to the floor (case 17 and SPP of 6.5 years) and
windows (case 24 and SPP of 7 years). The results of this study could help in future development of Dubai's GBRS
based on the technical, as well as the economic, viability of upgrading different building elements. .
Description
Keywords
Green building regulations
Building envelope
Cooling load
PassivHaus
Dubai-UAE
Citation
Abu-Hijleh, B. and Jaheen, N. (2019) “Energy and economic impact of the new Dubai municipality green building regulations and potential upgrades of the regulations,” Energy Strategy Reviews, 24, pp. 51–67.