Description of a methodology for decision support for energy efficient housing redesign

Abstract

Reduction in energy consumption and quality of indoor climate are equally important issues in the energy-efficient redesign process of buildings. The energy issue is related to the efficiency of the buildings in terms of environmental and economic concerns while the quality of the indoor climate is related to the health and comfort of the occupants. Redesigning for energy-efficiency in relation to the indoor climate is a knowledge-intensive process. The objective in this paper is to present an approach to provide integrity to deal with the growing amount of information and processing of this information in this domain. The practical focus is on the development of a redesign decision support tool for architects, which is going to ensure acceptable indoor climate on several energy levels, from the less ambitious through the most ambitious, with a particular interest in the improvement of natural ventilation capabilities.