PAPER REVIEW

DESIGN OPTIMIZATION OF VERNACULAR BUILDINGS IN

WARM AND HUMID CLIMATE OF NORTH – EAST INDIA.

SUBMITTED TO : DR. D. KANNAMMA

SUBMITTED BY: ANIRUDDH SHARMA
ROLL NUMBER: 201121002
M.ARCH – SEMESTER – 01
 TITLE
• PAPER TITLE: DESIGN OPTIMIZATION OF
VERNACULAR BUILDINGS IN WARM AND HUMID
CLIMATE OF NORTH – EAST INDIA.

• YEAR: 2014
 

• JOURNAL NAME: 30TH International Passive and Low Energy

Architecture (PLEA) Conference: Sustainable Habitat for
Developing Cities: Choosing the Way Forward – Proceedings.
(Held at CEPT University, Ahmedabad, Gujarat)
 

• SCOPUS: The paper is indexed in Scopus

(Elsevier’s abstract and citation database).
 AUTHORS

This paper was authored by three people:

 MANOJ KUMAR SINGH, PH.D.

 Local Environment Management and Analysis (LEMA), Universite’ de Liege, Chemin des Chevreuils,
1 - 4000 Liège, Belgium.
 Integrated Research and Action for Development (IRADe), C-80, Shivalik, Malviya Nagar, New Delhi 110017, India.

 SADHAN MAHAPATRA, MTECH.

 Department of Energy, Tezpur University, Tezpur, 784028, Assam, India.

 JAQUES TELLER, PH.D.

• Faculté des Sciences Appliquées, Department ArGEnCo, Local Environment Management and Analysis (LEMA), Université de
Liège, Chemin des Chevreu, 1 - 4000 Liège, Belgium.
 AIM

• TO DEVELOP DESIGN FOR BETTER THERMAL PERFORMANCE OF VERNACULAR BUILDINGS IN WARM AND HUMID CLIMATE
OF NORTH – EAST STATES OF INDIA.

OBJECTIVE

• The main objective was to perform series of studies to understand how a vernacular building responses to passive methods for achieving higher
thermal comfort keeping environmental parameters into consideration and suggest some economical and meaningful alteration that would help
the building to perform better.
 LOCATION OF STUDY
• Tezpur city, Assam.
• The city is in the eastern region of the state of Assam
along the bank of the river Brahmaputra.

CLIMATIC DATA OF THE LOCATION

• Climatic condition: WARM AND HUMID.
 Temperature Range:
Figure 1: LOCATION OF TEZPUR ON MAP
 SUMMER TEMPERATURE:
Maximum: 30 – 35 degrees Celsius.
Minimum: 22 – 27 degrees Celsius.
 WINTER TEMPERATURE:
Maximum: 25 – 30 degrees Celsius.
Minimum: 15 – 20 degrees Celsius.
 Relative Humidity (%): 75 – 90.
METHODOLOGY

Figure 2: METHODOLOGY FLOWCHART

 TOOL AND SOFTWARES
• Tools and software used for study and simulations were:

 Sketch-Up and its plug-in TRNSYS3D and TRNBuild: 3D modelling

 TRNSYS 17: Simulation tool to study the energy flow in between different
zones of the house.

 MATLAB Simulink: Used for processing the simulation data.

Figure 3: 3D model of selected vernacular house using Google

SketchUp, TRNSYS3D and TRNBuild.
VARIABLES INVOLVED IN STUDY

The research conducted for optimal thermal comfort is carried out keeping all indoor and outdoor environmental parameters into consideration.

• Some of the variables involved in the study are:

 Thermophysical properties and thickness of materials
 Window to wall ratio
 Glazing type
 Shading mechanism
 Internal load

• Some key parameters were considered for the study:

 Orientation of the building
 Passive solar design
 Ventilation
 Insulation on building envelope
 Shading and glazing area
 ANALYSIS
Parametric analysis of the collected data shows:
 From analysis of the climatic data, it is evident that high discomfort was experienced during summers because of high temperatures and relative humidity.

 The wind direction for the selected climatic zone is south, south-east and south-west. So, the orientation of the house in these directions would allow
natural ventilation that would decrease the discomfort due to high humidity levels.

 A wind study also showed that the wind velocity is high in the months of January to June.

 Based on the simulations, daily maximum and minimum temperature of zone 2 and zone 3 were almost similar but because of orientation zone 3 shows
signs of slightly better thermal comfort levels.

 Heat gain due to infiltration through openings for all eight orientations makes NW-SE most suitable as compared to others.

 In some scenarios where increased window areas with double glazing were provided the results showed an increase in daily maximum and minimum
temperature of indoor spaces in summer and winter.

 When the conditions were reversed, and the window areas were decreased there was less temperature swing in the indoor environment, but this suggestion
is not advisable because of the high humidity level of the region.

 When insulated walls were provided the indoor temperature swing in comparison to the base case rose much higher than expected.
 Since the difference in the ceiling with the common attic and the individual attic was negligible, the common attic was more preferred for safety reasons
as the north-eastern region of India falls under seismic zone V.
 OBSERVATIONS
Following observations were made while the study was being carried out:
 Out of three-set patterns for the house’s ceiling, the pattern without a false ceiling showed higher variations in daily indoor temperature swing.

 In the other two set patterns, it was observed that the difference in daily indoor temperature was negligible.

 Due to the complexity involved in the construction of the individual attic, the walls supporting them had to be load-bearing, and load-bearing walls do not
perform well under seismic forces.

 If the openings are properly operated discomfort caused due to heat gain and heat loss can be minimized.

 On increasing the window area heat gain could be significantly increased during winter due to the low altitude of the sun.

 Insulation provided has low inertia and does not allow heat from external walls to be radiated indoors and because of this low thermal inertia and high
infiltration becomes the root cause for large temperature swings.

 In the base case, the indoor temperature swing was 10 degrees.

 In summers high infiltration caused increased heat gain that can be a reason for increased indoor temperature that resulted in thermal discomfort.

 If the large window to wall ratio of such vernacular houses were properly utilized with correct shading techniques can help in achieving better thermal
comfort throughout the year.
 RESULTS
• Through the data collected from field measurements and surveys and simulations for the months of January, April, July, and October the difference in
the indoor temperature ranges are the same with slight variations.

• Zone operative temperature was lower than zone air temperature by 1 – 1.8 degrees Celsius and zone mean radiant temperature was lower than zone
operative temperature by 1.2 – 1.8 degrees Celsius.

CONCLUSION
• The study concludes that the scenario with common attic space shows the most desirable results and having a ceiling would act to the advantage by
minimizing daily indoor temperature swings.

• Since the nature of the building was vernacular and bioclimatic in nature the natural ventilation nullified the effect of insulation on daily swing of
indoor temperature.

• From the analysis of the data collected it was evident that judicial spread of openings with double glazing and increased size of openings would have
a noticeable impact on indoor thermal comfort.

• Similarly, if the shading devices for these openings were properly designed it would help in achieving better comforts by providing better shade in
summers and allowing heat gain in winters.

• The present orientation of the house was concluded to be wisely selected.

THANK YOU