ENERGY CONSUMPTION IS

BY NO MEANS AN
INDICATOR OF THE DEGREE
OF COMFORT IN BUILDINGS
–justify the statement by exploring
your house as a case

Submitted By:
MD ROBIUL ISLAM
ID: 180150
Term : 2, Year : 3rd
Architecture Discipline
Khulna University
 “Energy Consumption is By no means An indicator of the
degree of comfort In Buildings” – I agree with this point.

“Energy consumption is by no means an indicator of the degree of

comfort in buildings.” – Yes by comparing the energy consumption rate
and the comfort in building we can decide how well the design of the
building is. Energy cost can help us to understand the comfort of the
building. But it is not a good thing to achieve comfort with high energy
consumption where we can have same amount of comfort with low
energy consumption.
In past people lived in cages because they were in need of only safety.
But by the time pass, house or buildings are not limited for safety; also
those become a primary source of comfort for people. Now days
people built buildings for their safety as well as comforts. Human is
innovating its residential conditions continuously for better health
comforts. The productivity of human depends upon his/her comfort
index, if person is in a comfort zone he/she feels better and lives
healthy life.
All technological developments on this earth is towards the betterment
of life, health and working conditions of human being. The construction
of house is the first invention of human towards making its life
comfortable. The invention of building engineering has added many
features towards the comfort of human life. But during last century this
comfort parameters are under assessment and buildings and their
indoor environment has been improvised a lot. Due to this
improvisation human comfort indicators are being assessed. These
human comfort indicators vary from place to place, season to season
according to the climatic changes on the earth. If comfort conditions
are good and supportive it gives better life and productivity of human
workforce. On the other side if indoor environment of building is not
conducive and comfortable it's negative impacts are visible on human
health, life and productivity.
There are many factors that affect human comfort in the internal built
environment. Human comfort is affected by thermal factors; physical
factors and personal factors. Another factor that can affect human
comfort is sound of the environment around them. The final factor that
affects the human comfort is the visual of the room and the light
intensity. There are ways to measure the physical factors that affect
human thermal comfort, the sound comfort and the visual comfort.
Thermal factor: THERMAL COMFORT is the outcome of a well-balanced
combination of building systems adapted to both the location of
the building as well as the type of activity performed within
the building or the room of the building. Thermal comfort is
important for health and well-being as well as productivity. A lack
of thermal comfort causes stress among building occupants. When they
are too warm, people can feel tired; when too cold, they will be restless
and distracted.
Acoustic: The sound of the environment that a person is in greatly
affects their comfort in the building. Sound is a form of energy that is
transmitted in pressure waves and changes depending on the pressure
of the air in the room.
Light/ visual factor: If the light levels are too low or too high then it will
not be as suitable. Light travels in rays and bounces off objects and into
the eye. The rays cannot bend so they must go in straight lines, but light
can be refracted through certain materials which can bend the beam
slightly. The light needs to be the right intensity so that the eyes don’t
have to strain too much if it is too dark or if the light is too bright it may
blind.
To achieve those comforts people use energy and many design ideas.
But at present the use of energy level reach at a alarming point. Also
we cannot compromise human comforts. So it is very important to
achieve the best comforts by using minimum energy. Energy
consumption depends on 3 factors.

Three types of factor can be identified , for the

variation between the same type use buildings –
Building Design .
Services Design And Performance .
Occupant Behavior .
Building design: A well designed building can use more renewable or
natural energy like air, light to achieve the comforts. So the use of
energy can be very low in the building. Like a poor design building need
to use a huge amount of energy to achieve the comfort level. We would
be somewhat surprised to find two family saloon cars returning fuel
consumption figures differing as widely as 6m.p.g and 60m.p.g.! We
might reasonably conclude that if the first car could get the family from
A to B for ten times less than the second, then the design of the second
car is seriously suspect, showing an almost immoral disregard for the
environment. Why then do we tolerate this situation in buildings?
This is the plan of my house. The selected blue area is my room. We
can see a large opening in the south where from mainly fresh air
come to the room. But due to lack of cross ventilation and for a
huge noise come to the outside market with lack of tree the cold air
cannot enter the room easily. That’s why I have to use electric fan
for cold air all time. If there is another window for cross ventilation
or if we can shift the window then we can have cold air to achieve
my desire comfort with less energy. The red zone is my parents
room which is located west side and maximum heat gain in summer
and evening season . The yellow zone is dinning which is lack of light
and ventilation .
The major problem of my room such as
 Cross ventilation problem
 Availability of air & light
 Bad arrangement of plan & funtions
 Noise problem of main road & market
 Heat problem [extreme hot environment in summer & very cold
in winter]
 Services design and performance: Always natural energy is not
enough for desire comfort. That’s why we have to use different
services. But by a proper plan we can get the full support from a well
service .

The yellow zone is mainly service portion which mainly lack off
enough lobby space , natural light can not enter the space ,, there is
no ventilation , living space always use artificial light which is lost of
energy and cost of a electricity .
That’s why for visual comfort we have to use electric light always.
Doesn’t matter its day or night.
Occupant behavior : Some times energy consumption depends on
personal habit of occupants. Also the presence of a particular activity
or process in the building, such as the use of s large computer in an
office building, a heavy use of energy for a building.

The red mark area is my parent’s room. This room has a cross
ventilation with south west opening. But for them the south air is not
enough because west sun heat the room more than the south air cool
the room. And my parents want to live in such a room where
temperature will be 19-21’C. For this habit they have to use AC in their
room. In the west side have no sun shade which can protect the heat
of sun .
 EQUIPMENT list of my house which have gather much energy
consumption

EQUIPMENT NOS
FUNCTION/PROGRAMME

ENTRY LED LIGHT 1

LIVING & Dinning SPACE LED TELEVISION 1

TUBE LIGHT 1

LED LIGHT 2

CEILING FAN 2

OTHERS PHONE CHARGER 4

ELECTRIC IRON 1

REFRIGERATOR 1

DEEP FRIDGE 1

COMMON TOILET LED LIGHT 1

VENTILATOR FAN 1

KITCHEN LED LIGHT 1

Rice Coocker 1

Ventilator Fan 1

Induction Cooker 1
EQUIPMENT list of my house which have gather much energy
consumption

EQUIPMENT NOS
FUNCTION/PROGRAMME

Outside Kitchen MICRO-OVEN 1

BLENDER 1

WATER HEATER 1

Bedroom 1 CEILING FAN 1

Led Light 1

Tube Light 1

Wifi 1

Bedroom 2 CEILING FAN 1

Led Light 1

Tube Light 1

Stand Fan 1

Toilet LED LIGHT 1

VENTILATOR FAN 1
 ELECTRICITY BILL

MONTH UNIT BILL

JUNE - 19 220 1091
JULY - 19 225 1116
AUGUST -19 212 1050
SEPTEMBER -19 205 998
OCTOBER - 19 201 966
NOVEMBER -19 199 960
DECEMBER – 19 195 955
JANUARY-20 215 1068
FEBRUARY-20 210 983
MARCH - 20 218 1082
APRIL - 20 224 1133
MAY -20 226 1120
JUN - 20 235 1165

From this list we can see that during summer the energy
consumption rate goes high to achieve comfort. If our building has
more passive system, then we can achieve the same amount of
comfort with low energy consumption rate.

In short energy consumption indicates the comforts in building but this

is not the meaning that high energy consumption can give high level of
comfort. The same comfort can be gain by well design of the building,
by adopting passive system. But sometimes we have to use active
system also to achieve the desire comfort. Our target should be
achieving highest possible level of comfort by lowest energy
consumption. Then we can call it the best design of the building.