LIMITS _ REACTIVE SKIN FOR SELF SUFFICIENT BUILDINGS.
ASS.01_MaCT-19dec2016 SELF SUFFICIENT HABITAT a course of: V.Guallart,E. Moran student:Federica Ciccone
image cover’s rights : @https://it.pinterest.com/pin/381680137149741283/
Assignment_01 Write a brief paper about “Role of limits in Architecture, towards a perspective of SelfSufficient buildings ”
01 02
Introduction about “limits� in architecture
p.07
Learning by nature
p.12
The builindg envelope
p.21
Historical Evolution of the layer
p.24
Examples in contemporary architecture
p.30
Last technologies in field
p.35
Perspectives and expectations for the future
p.40
03 04
1.Reactive “limits” in nature under input. (from up to down: Leaf’s surface, Chamaleont and Human’s skin).
01.
Abstract: The key role of the building envelope in attaining building energy efficiency and satisfactory indoor comfort has long been established. Nevertheless, until recent times, all efforts and attention have mainly been focused on increasing and optimizing the thermal insulation of the envelope components, their contribution also under the energetic capacity and their multi-role in the potential benefits of this technological development are relevant, since the building envelope plays a key role in controlling the energy and mass flows from outdoors to indoors (and vice versa) and, moreover, the facades offer a significant opportunity for solar energy exploitation, in order to reduce the energy demand, to maximize the indoor comfort conditions and to produce energy at the site, these almost ‘self-sufficient’, or even ‘positive energy’ building skins, frequently incorporate different technologies and are functionally connected to other building services and installations. An overview of the technological evolution of the building envelope that has taken place, ranging from traditional components to the innovative skins, will be given in this paper, focusing on the different approaches that have characterized this development, trought several researches examples, in way to demonstrate that the limitation of the existing facades could be overcome only by switching from ‘static’ to ‘responsive’ and ‘dynamic’ systems. This search wants to underline the key role of building envelope in the architectural organism, underlining the existing explicit analogy between this one and the anatomical systems of the reactive skins, purely quoting examples scientific legacies; to the circle of the biochemistry, human and animal neurology, to go then to an intensive excursus, that crosses and underlines the fundamental steps of the evolution of the same, from the primordial examples, up to our days; with the goal to show the potentialities that the building’s skins has, not only hold in the economies of confort and consumes of the single building, but also in a widened and repetibile vision, that could also develops a key role in the global environmental context.
Keywords: Sustainable, Development, Performance, Building, Envelope, Adaptive, Responsive, Multifunctional, Facade, Advanced integrated facades, Skin, Reactve, Hystory, Technology, Renewable energy
1.1. Introduction about “limits” in architecture Beginning to diving into the world of the Self Sufficient Architecture and in my specific case in the context that invests the Building’s sector, in way to reach the definition of a search about Selfsufficients Building, results spontaneous to direct the path, choosing as I conductor-spin of the search, the concrete meaning of “Selfsuffcient” in architecture...or anyway, which this mostly means. If we look generally at the history of constructions and architecture, we can understand how high is the level of mankind’s impact, in this sector specifically, on the earth-system...about how much the housebuilding results and is resulted, the maximum producer of environmental disasters in the whole production chain. 1
1.buildings global pollution’s data
HOW TO DO TO REMEDY AT THIS? WHAT ARE THE DUTIES OF HUMANITY WITH REGARD TO SUCH IMPACT? WHAT ARE THE DUTIES OF AN ARCHITECT OF THE TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY ABOUT THE ECOSYSTEM IN WHICH IT IS INSERTED? Perhaps is this, is from here, that we must re-depart to fully understand our professional and ethical role in the society. The architecture for centuries has burdened, “taking” in unilateral way from the environment in which was inserted...holding the earth as a mine of resources, as it is, however, in a materical, spatial, ecosystemic sense. The architecture fits into a space, that before her presence, had an other identities, changing these forever, relatively or not from the life cycle of the same, making the same irreversible change, sometimes enhanced features, sometimes not. We could open at this point a debate without end, respect the role of the architecture and her ethics, but returning to our initial theme, we are understanding how much this one was tied up to the history of this field, being founding part of a very complex and multilayered circle. The house, in her more privimitive definition, was the act, the action to delimitate, conquer a space, to create a space for the man, in way to give him protection, a shelter, a cover too (from the primitive hut, to Vitruvio..to the Laugier’s rielaborations, revision and amendings). The architecture was born to give a shelter, a protection from weathered and predators, storms, from the external dangers that were a great problem for the first communities. Maybe could be sufficient, we just need to turn back to thousand years ago to to find again in the Vitruvio’s De Architectura 3 the simple driving concepts that should make lighthouse of the architecture of every time. The architecture must have for purpose: solidity, utility and beauty, three simple words, that underline and reread in completely different way the history of the archistars’ architecture to us contemporary, plotting again her bases’ spins and threads: purpose-solidity-utility-beauty.
2.The Primitive Hut as architectural theory was brought to life over the mid-1700s till the mid-1800s, theorised in particular by (Abbé) Marc-Antoine Laugier, is a concept that explores the origins of architecture and its practice, that explores the anthropological relationship between man and the natural environment as the fundamental basis for the creation of architecture. The idea of The Primitive Hut contends that the ideal architectural form embodies what is natural and intrinsic.
3. « Haec autem ita fieri debent, ut habeatur ratio firmitatis, utilitatis, venustatis. » (IT) « In tutte queste cose che si hanno da fare devesi avere per scopo la solidità, l’utilità, e la bellezza. » (Marco Vitruvio Pollione, De Architectura, liber I, 2)
“We have built more than all previous history together, but we hardly register on the same scales. [...]we have been reading a footnote under a microscope hoping it would turn into a novel, our concern for the masses has blinder us to People’s Architecture,, 4 A roof, some walls, a different ground from the external earth, defines her, defines the act to construct, the gesture to build architecture..from the primordis to our days with all the technical, ethnic and cultural evolutions of the case. So, I think that is the enlance, above all, the cornerstone element able to capsize the order of the things, able to react to the impact of the architecture in the environment, understoding his 360°role in this contest, for this reason, I have chosen this theme within the first research’s exercise.. because I think this one, could be being the architectural element that holds the most powerful potential to answer to the applications of a real self-sufficient buildings’ system. The architecture,ethically, must respond to the problem of pollution , soil’s consumption, climatic changes.. giving her contribution and the envelope had, for a long time, a protagonist’ role in this context.
4.Rem Koolhaas from Junkspace, 2001
- IT’S OFTEN SMARTER TO BORROW FROM NATURE THAN REINVENT THE WHEEL5-
0.1. Learning by nature
If we started over considering, the building as an organism, able to interact with his context, nothing simpler comes whether to intend, the limits of the same, technically known in building field as building wrap, as envelope and above all as his skin. But not skin, like which is intend by interior designers and architectural artists to us contemporary ...not as a surface, not as a covering’s façade.. but means as membrane of interchange between inside and outside. 5.quotation extract by the approach of researchers at the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC) to remove carbon dioxide (CO2 ) from the atmosphere, and convert it into an efficient, inexpensive fuel.
6.definition from Treccani Encyclopedia >http://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/cute/
Trying to approach us in classical way to this comparison, we bring the encyclopedic definition of the term6:
pelle/cute > skin: The continuous wrap that dresses again the whole body of the Vertebrates and that, in correspondence of the natural openings of it, continuous in the mucous membranes that carpet the communicating hollow with the outside. The term is used more particularly to referring at the man’s skin [...] it is constituted of two fundamental layers: an outside, the epidermis, never mentioned in the adult, with epithelial structure and one, deeper, the derma or corion, with a connectival nature, to a large bigger part originated from the foil cutis of the somite [..] The c’s productions of the Cordatis, that carry out functions of materials’ exchange with the outside.Sensorial apparatus situated in the epidermis, [...] carrying out function of equilibrium and orientation in the space. The c’s functions are numerous and complex: particular importance have the protective ones, the thermoregulators one, the execretor one (water’s elimination, chloride of sodium etc.), also the secretor one (production of sweat, sebo), that synthetic (formation of melanin and keratin). Referring to the level of the c. it also happens, under the catalyst effect of the solar light, the activation of the provitamin D. Particularly important, is, also, the sensitive function, due to the presence of numerous nervous terminations, free or connected with the sensitive corpuscles, whose stimulation gives place to tactile, thermal and painful sensations [..]. According to a research by the Sant’Anna Institute of Pisa, the LIT of Genoa and the BioMimetics and the Cognitive Robotics Laboratory of the Brooklyn College, City University of New York; has emerged as the 66% of the “intellectual” abilities of the octopus tied up to the nerves they are found in his “arms” or we could say better in the 90% of his wrap. 7
7.http://www.santannapisa.it/en/multimedia/reuters-octopus-arm-reaches-soft-robot-revolution and also “A bioinspired soft manipulator for minimally invasive surgery” paper by T. Ranzani, G. Gerboni, M. Cianchetti and A. Menciassi, Bioinspiration & Biomimetics, Volume 10, Number 3
“Two-Thirds of the octopus’ nerves of the octopus aren’t found in his brain, but in his tentacles”, James Wood explains, (sea biologist of the Hawaii’s University, to Oahu, not involved in the study). That nerves allow to the tentacles to quickly change form, color and consistence, to the suckers to pick up and to taste objects. The neural net of the octopus is distributed in the whole body, Wood comments, but only in last analysis this is checked by the brain. “We don’t know indeed as the whole system it works”, but the new study has allowed the scientists to make the first observations on the formality with which the common octopus (Octopus Vulgaris) checks a complex system as his own tentacles. The octopus possesses 3 hearts and has the ability to change color very fastly and with a great precision in the detail. It exploits this ability both to camouflage whether to communicate with his similars. Principal feature is the presence of a double line of suckers on each of the eight tentacles, which can quickly move expelling with strength the water through a siphon, that is also used for the issue of the black ink used in defensive operation to confuse possible raiders. It is a auto-recognition mechanism, that is present in the octopus’s skin to prevent that these become knotted in his same body: information explained by a new study published on Current Biology. Before now anybody had investigated to fund this phenomenon, Frank W.Grasso (co-author of the study and manager of the BioMimetics and Cognitive Robotics Laboratory of the Brooklyn College, City University of New York) explains. The mechanism that regulates this, nevertheless, is, surprisingly , a real simple way to check the complex system that are the tentacles of the octopus. Not by chance this new, aroused the interest of the researchers that y work in the field of the robotics.
5.”Surfaces”Patterns
5.Reactive “surfaces”
Observe to the microscope tentacles and suckers of the octopus ‘to copy ‘ the mechanisms in an robotizated animal, is what have done, exatly, the researchers of the Sant’Anna Superior School of Pisa and the Italian institute of technology (Iit) in Genoa, cooling to -180°C the necessary tools for the analysis. Thanks to this technology the scientists have improved their knowledge about the morphology of the octopus’ layers that allow him to explore the environment, to manipulate objects and to stick to surfaces for the locomotion and the search of preys. In this way, has shown the complex distribution of the pore, on the external surface of the octopus’ tentacles, fundamental in the cutaneous absorption of the oxygen. Besides, to their inside, also has been observed the three-dimensional architecture of the numerous types of muscular bundles that wind the central nervous cord organs that allow the animal to develop the functions that characterize its abilities. In the suckers, has been described the mechanism of cellular exchange of the infundibulum (the most external portion of the sucker that comes into contact with the surfaces) , the external and inside characteristics of the denticleses (micrometrici reliefs to form of dome, pierced by pore of 100nm, that cover the inside surface of the sucker), showing trought nanometrical detail the channels of the pore that allow the nervous terminations to come into contact with the water of sea. So,the Octopus Vulgaris also represents a model to realize new devices in the field of the soft robotics, the robotics that aims to develop robot using material ‘soft’ and intelligent. The results of the study have been published on ‘Microscopy Research and Technique.’ -WHAT DOES ALL THIS THIS ESCURSUS WITH ARCHITECTURE, AND WITH A SEARCH WITHIN THE “LIMITS” OF THE SAME ONE? We will answer that it is pertinent, and also in a properly way. This is only one example of how much we can learn by the nature and about how many the sciences, in other sectors, are trying to deepen this field finding the answers that feed the developments of robotics and domotic, but also regarding systems of relationship and interchange with “the external environment.” The tentacles of an octopus, the surface of the leaves, the structure of the foil that allows the complex, and always rich of close examinations, photosynthesis’ system, the human skin with her mechanisms of reaction, to internal and external stimulus, transpiration, thermal regulation; the juicy and furnished of thorns surface of a cactus or the meddler world of reptiles and of their scaled mutant skin or the magic one, of the chromatic system of defense, camouflaging of a chameleon, result as direct examples of how much the architecture, above all the architecture of the building wrap, is able and must learn from the nature. As has been above underlined, the topos are the same, the characterizing matters the abilities that are required to a building envelope, able to go toward the direction of a self-sufficient architecture, result declared, as it regards the thermoigrometric comfort, but also to insert with an always more smaller impact and, auspiciously, in active way, in the surrounding environment : -surfaces able to improve the external and internal conditions through chemical, or technical trials - reactive envelopes activated through sensitive and reacting surfaces through techniques that space from the robotics, to the domotic, to the materical reaction to input of thermal, acoustic and/or chromatic level. -high-level of adaptability to mutable conditions (resiliency) -ability to maintain, autonomously, conditions of subsistence, liveability , comfort; exploiting the energies actively accumulated, absorbed passively, captable of the external environment -ability to turn such these energies into resources and if in excess in output, evolving in productive organisms / systems - ability to withstand to external and inside harmful input for the structurability of the same (bad weather, catastrophes, condition climatic urban e/o, contextual adverse).
“THE URGENCIES OF THE PRESENT PUSH US TO REREAD THE STORIES OF THE PAST, NOT AS MERE ACCUMULATION OF ERUDITE DATA, BUT AS LIVING MEMORY OF THE HUMAN COMMUNITIES (...) . SO IS DUTY, RATHER WORK, OF WHOM “DOES THE HISTORY” (TO) CULTIVATE A LONG LOOK/GAZE, A VISION OF THINGS AND MEN THAT CONCERNS SO MUCH THE PAST, HOW MUCH THE FUTURE; NECESSARILY HINGING THEMSELVES ON THE PRESENT, NOT AS PASSIVE SPECTATORS, BUT INTERPRETING THE CONTRADICTIONS OF THE CONTRARY WITH/UNDER THE LIGHT OF THE HISTORY, AS A NECESSARY PREMISE TO TRY TO BUILD A DIFFERENT AND BEST FUTURE.” 8
02.
The building envelope Wanting to look also only at the press, in the more simple/common way, emerges clearly and bossily, a complex actual discussion regard the global environmental situation and the climate change, with all the related resulting weather-disasters; and become more extreme, and emerges primarily, in which measure the resilience has become a non-negotiable imperative for facility managers — as important to their jobs as just about anything else they do. Much of the coverage of resilience in these days is about the design of new buildings. There’s a definitive dearth of information and advice for facility managers on how to make existing facilities more resilient. However facility managers choose to focus on resilience, one thing is clear: It’s a concept that will continue to be critical. As Ellen Vaughan, policy director, sustainable buildings, for the Environmental and Energy Study Institute, puts it: “There is a growing realization that we need to ‘future-proof’ buildings to withstand, adapt, and respond to changes and threats.” Prioritizing resilience for their buildings is the best way facility managers can do just that. - For at least the last decade, scientists, economists, activists, and politicians have argued fiercely about how best to spend money to address climate change — should we admit substantial shifts in the climate are inevitable, and sink money into adapting to our new reality? Or should we continue the good fight to reduce emissions with the long-term goal of preventing the worst climate change-related impacts? Most would agree that we should do both adaptation and mitigation, but the battle is fought over the degree to which one is more effective. For facilities, the answer is also both, but it’s a less hotly contested issue. That’s because, in many cases, when you’re working on climate change mitigation (in the form of making buildings sustainable), you are by default also working on adaptation (in the form of resilience). “If you start really thinking about sustainability, you’re going to get pretty far down the road to being resilient,” says Jim Newman, founder and principal of Linnean Solutions. In other words, sustainability complements building resilience. The importance of considering these two concepts in tandem is that doing so adds meat to the argument for making capital improvements to existing buildings that can have cost-savings, sustainability, and resilience benefits and there are, say us Greg Zimmerman, two other key potentially high-performance areas where building resilience and sustainability complement each other: building exteriors, envelope, and ventilation, and water and stormwater issues. 9 Since the early 1990s, sustainability has become an increasing priority for facilities projects. It is no secret that building construction and operation have an enormous direct and indirect impact on the environment in terms of energy use, atmospheric emissions, use of raw materials, waste generation, water use, and many other factors. As the economy and population continue to expand, the design, construction and operation community will face increasing challenges to meet the new demands for facilities that are accessible, secure, healthy, and productive while minimizing their impact on the environment. 10 For the design, construction and operation of a facility, the building envelope
8_«Le urgenze del presente ci spingono a rileggere le vicende del passato non come mero accumulo di dati eruditi ma come memoria vivente delle comunità umane (…). E’ infatti dovere, anzi mestiere, di chi “fa storia” coltivare uno sguardo lungo, una visione delle cose e degli uomini che riguarda tanto il passato quanto il futuro, necessariamente imperniandosi sul presente ma non come spettatori passivi, bensì interpretandone le contraddizioni alla luce della storia, premessa necessaria per provare a costruire un futuro diverso e migliore». Salvatore Settis 9_ Resilience and Sustainability, Sustainability Complements Building Resilience Report, by Greg Zimmerman 10_Sustainability of the Building Envelope , Report by Rob Bolin, PE, Syska Hennessy Group, WBDG, National Institute of Building Sciences
is an especially important interface between the indoor and outdoor environments. The building envelope is comprised of the outer elements of a building— foundations, walls, roof, windows, doors and floors. The prime functions of the building envelope are to provide shelter, security, solar and thermal control, moisture control, indoor air quality control, access to daylight, and views to outside, fire resistance, acoustics, cost effectiveness and aesthetics. Because of the varied and sometimes competing functions associated with the building envelope, an integrated, synergistic approach considering all phases of the facility life cycle is warranted. This “sustainable� approach supports an increased commitment to environmental stewardship and conservation, and results in an optimal balance of cost, environmental, societal, and human benefits while meeting the mission and function of the intended facility. The main objectives of sustainable design are to avoid resource depletion of energy, water, and raw materials; prevent environmental degradation caused by facilities and their infrastructure throughout their life cycle; and create built environments that are accessible, secure, healthy, and productive. While the definition of what constitutes sustainable building design, construction and operation is constantly evolving, there are six fundamental principles that nearly everyone agrees on. - Optimize Site Potential, - Optimize Energy Use, - Protect and Conserve Water, -Use Greener Materials, -Enhance Indoor Environmental Quality (IEQ), -Optimize Operational and Maintenance Practices. 10
Sustainable design is a design approach put in place to promote the environmental quality and the quality of building indoor environment by reducing negative impacts on building and the natural environment. Also, it is a design philosophy that seeks to incorporate sustainable development concept in terms of initiatives and values into sustainable building envelope design, using Integrated Performance Model. This was validated by comparing the energy efficiency performance from selected case studies of buildings with sustainable development concept and building envelope without sustainable development concept. It is expected that the incorporation of sustainable development concept in terms of initiatives and values will enhance the energy performance of building envelopment development and bring about building sustainability.11
11_ Research paper : Switching from static to adaptable and dynamic building envelopes: A paradigm shift for the energy efficiency in buildings, M.Perino, Department of Energy, Politecnico di Torino.
The concept of sustainable development has evolved greatly since it was introduced by Brundtland Commission in 1987 (WCED, 1987). Now it is being used for various purposes in the society by professional. In the process of this development, different meanings have been used to define sustainable development concept. In all, there is a consensus that the environment, society and economic are the important factors for achieving sustainable development concept. Yet the concept of sustainable development is still unclear and difficult to understand. Many dimensions have been attributed to sustainable development concept
and sustainable building design (Lombardi, 1999 and Ding, 2005). The idea of sustainable development concept was discussed at United Nation Conference on environment and development held at Rio de Janeiro in 1992 (United Nation Conference on Environment and Development(UNCED), 1992 and Hughes, 2000). The Summit was the first international conference attended by world leaders on environmental issues to promote international cooperation for global agreements and partnerships for environmental protection (Harding, 1998). As such, numbers of important conclusions were reached at the summit and the Rio declaration where they highlighted 27 strategies for achieving sustainable development goal. In spite of this discussion and international deliberations, the concept of sustainable development is still complex, multi-dimensional and ambiguous to understand within the context of just environmental issues (Lombardi, 1999 and Ding, 2005). There is still a challenge of defining what actually constitute sustainable development concept and values that can be used for sustainable design and assess the sustainable performance of the building envelope. 12 Therefore, it is necessary to examine the role of sustainable development’s concept in sustainable envelope design by investigating the impacts of this on building sustainability. The key role of the building envelope in attaining building energy efficiency and satisfactory indoor comfort has long been established. Nevertheless, until recent times, all efforts and attention have mainly been focused on increasing and optimizing the thermal insulation of the envelope components. This strategy was a winning approach for a long time, but its limitations became obvious when users and designers started to consider the overall energy demand of a building and started to aim for Zero Energy Building (ZEB) or nearly ZEB goals. New and more revolutionary concepts and technologies needed to be developed to satisfy such challenging requirements. The potential benefits of this technological development are relevant since the building envelope plays a key role in controlling the energy and mass flows from outdoors to indoors (and vice versa) and, moreover, the facades offer a significant opportunity for solar energy exploitation. Several researches have demonstrated that the limitation of the existing facades could be overcome only by switching from ‘static’ to ‘responsive’ and ‘dynamic’ systems, such as Multifunctional Facade Modules (MFMs) and Responsive Building Elements (RBE). These components are able to continuously and pro-actively react to outdoor and indoor environment conditions and facilitate and enhance the exploitation of renewable and low exergy sources. In order to reduce the energy demand, to maximize the indoor comfort conditions and to produce energy at the site, these almost ‘self-sufficient’, or even ‘positive energy’ building skins frequently incorporate different technologies and are functionally connected to other building services and installations.
An overview of the technological evolution of the building envelope that has taken place, ranging from traditional components to the innovative skins, will be given in this document, while focusing on the different approaches that have characterized this development. Examples of innovative solutions for responsive and dynamic components and the future trends of development will also be described in the nexts paragraphs.
12_ The impact of sustainable building envelope design on building sustainability using Integrated Performance Model , by Joseph Iwaro and Abrahams Mwasha, International Journal of Sustainable Built Environment. 13_Switching from static to adaptable and dynamic building envelopes: A paradigm shift for the energy efficiency in buildings, a paper by M.Perino and V. Serra, Department of Energy, Politecnico di Torino.
2.2.Historical Evolution of the layer In an effort to analyse the influence of building envelope design on building sustainability, it is important to address the fundamental role of sustainable development concept in building sustainability. Building envelope is the main component in building responsible for building ability to protect the indoor environment from external environmental impacts. It is the interface between the external environment and indoor environment. Building envelope protects the indoor environment, comfort conditions against adverse environmental effects and subsequently regulates energy consumption, resource consumption and environmental degradation. Apart from its protective and regulatory functions, building envelope controls solar and thermal flow, as well as moisture flow in and out of the building. It also controls the indoor air quality, fire, wind, rain and acoustic effects on building. This suggests the need to make building envelope sustainable as an alternative approach for achieving building sustainability through sustainable envelope design. However, there is a need to look into the impacts of environment on building envelope as related building sustainability. Building envelope protects the building against environmental impacts such as wind, rain, temperature difference; vapour pressure difference, industrial pollution, solar radiation and soil temperature (Green Building, 2011). Environmental impact is an important sustainability factor that influences other sustainability factors such as energy efficiency, material efficiency, and external benefit of building in terms of comfort conditions. 12 In the above energy efficiency performance assessment, the building envelope with sustainable design initiatives record the highest energy efficiency performance score. The sustainable performance is significantly influenced by the energy efficiency performance of that alternative. Therefore, it is imperative that sustainable development concept that involves sustainable initiatives such as sustainable development concept’s elements, life cycle analysis, and energy conservation strategies be incorporated into sustainable envelope design to achieve building sustainability. It is therefore recommended that for any building envelope design to be made sustainable, all the sustainable performance criteria also known as sustainable development values such as energy efficiency, economic efficiency, environmental impact, regulation efficiency, material efficiency and external benefit must be assessed. Also, the four interrelated principles of sustainable development that emphasised the need to minimise environmental resources for future generation through resources recycling and reviewable process, involving the participation of building and construction expert in sustainable devolvement decision making, the preservation of ecosystem, energy conservation and resources conservation for future building and ensuring equal access to natural and environmental resources for future generation as demonstrated in this study must be considered as well for sustainable design of the building envelope. 12_ The impact of sustainable building envelope design on building sustainability using Integrated Performance Model , by Joseph Iwaro and Abrahams Mwasha, International Journal of Sustainable Built Environment.
The use of the renewable energetic sources to improve the energetic performances of a building, doesn’t mean only to install fittings for the production of heating and electricity (thermal solar collectors, fittings fotovoltaici, microturbine eoliche, fittings geotermici, etc), but first of all, means to do in way that the same structure of the building, can able to exploit, in the
better way, the free, natural and cleaning energy that it originates from the renewable sources, above all from the sun. For this reason, all the housing models that make of some energetic saving their primary target(bio-buildings, prefabricated houses energetically efficient, buildings to energy’s cost almost zero, passive houses, ecological houses, etc), have need of active systems (the fittings), but above all of passive systems for the heating and the air conditioning of the inside environments. Various are the techniques of construction used by the ancient populations , directed, also, to guarantee good conditions of liveability in places where the natural environment was less favorable. The inside cortyards , towers of the wind and thick walls are only some of the contrived systems for the passive conditioning of the built environment. In the Middle East, for example, disadvantageous area to the installations because of the tall temperatures reached in the summer, (over the 40°C) and of the warm winds and of the big thermal excursion between day and night, they are made necessary various stratagems directed to improve the liveability of the housing spaces. The results have been spontaneously the fruit of elaborate methodologies rather than of a specific search, matured through different experiences of populations, installed in adjacent geographical areas. For example, in Iran already in 3000 B.C., the houses were built with very thick walls, in way to create in the daytime a strong thermal accumulation in the walls, whose heat was surrendered then in the freshest hours of the night. Further shrewdness were adopted in the constructions of this time, were, among the others, the opening of the buildings, almost, exclusively in the inside courtyards, primarily cultivated in way to avoid the solar radiation of the walls and, also, the use of the dome, for which the warm air tends to move in the tall part of the same one, refreshing in this way, the low zones, daily used by the people.
The towers of the wind (called Badgir into the Farsi language) are an architectural solution used also in the ancient Persia, to exploit the eolic energy and the principle of convection, with the purpose to mitigate the summer heat through the ventilation and the passive conditioning of the inside environments, making, therefore, the residences more liveable and comfortable. The towers of the wind represent one of the more more sophisticated system of passive conditioning in the world, also today. Introduced in Iran in the X century to B.C, these towers are special fireplaces with a rectangular or polygonal plant section, divided by vertical separations in bricks and with some openings on the superior side. In correspondence of every opening there is a duct, in which the winds are channeled. Existed, as a rule, two kinds of towers to wind.There are the Towers of wind that ventilate the insides of the buildings trough convection, introducing therefore fresh air in the environments and pushing out warm air; and then, also, some Wind’s Towers that cool the structure trough the joined action of convection and evaporation, where the temperature of the incoming air’s flow lowers for ventilation and evaporation, being the air moves above a channel of water or in a duct buried in the deep ground, in which the temperature maintains this fresh and almost unchanged for the whole year. The use of these towers as system of passive climatization, also works in absence of winds, turning into a structure of natural extraction, where the warm air, that naturally tend to climb upward because lighter, it goes out trough the openings of the fireplace; and during the night the tower cools, therefore the air in contact with the cold masonry of the tower, becomes denser, it goes down and it enters the building again. The mouth of the fireplace is drawn, in way to create a zone of low pressure in the summit of the tower and the fall of pressure baits a tide of air toward the fireplace. Then, during the day the tower heats itself, the masonry surrenders the heat creating a tide of descending air toward the tower. The walls of construction of the towers are very thick, so that to have a high power of thermal accumulation,in way to bait a strong difference of pressure among inside and outside. Besides the communications between the tower and the building, can be close and to open according the necessities ,with some special doors able to close and open the ducts. The more common places of use of the Wind’s Towers were the houses and the places of cult, where they served to create comforting situations of habitability during the summer heatwave, and where, often, were combined with other architectural elements studied to cool the environments; for instance fountains, water’s puddles, inside gardens, trees; besides were used in the cisterns, in way to create a re-circle of air inside the structure, so that to prevent the birth of mold and microorganisms in the warmest zones and without circle of air, and also to maintain the water fresh during the summer. We can perhaps define the Wind’s Towers, the first example of reactive envelope and,also today, their principle could be re-interpretated and used in the modern systems of construction, as shown by some examples, which the Kensington Oval Stadium in Barbados° and the Zion National Park Visitor Centre in the Utah. The Wall of Trombe, is one of the most known solar passive systems to indirect profit. Since his origins the system has been protagonist of a series of applications on different buildings and following experimentations, whose consequence in the years has been the ideation of new modern configurations of the system of Trompe, examinated with the purpose to implement, always more, its efficiency.
We can find a reinterpretation of all this tradictional systems in the Health Center for Poverty-Stricken Sudanese Refugees cooled With Iranian Ventilation Technique, by Tam Associati Arquitects. The pediatric health care center is found on the outskirts of Port Sudan, in a poverty-stricken area with a large concentration of refugees. The clinic is one of the few health centers in the area and provides free health care to all children. Specifically, the hospital was built on commission by the Italian NGO, Emergency, an organization that provides free medical and surgical treatment to the civilian victims of war, land mines and poverty. In order to give the hospital a stable and efficient foundation, various sustainable features were implemented. Using a blend of modern and traditional technology worked for the sustainable integration, especially considering the region’s extreme climatic and social conditions. For temperature control and air flow, the building uses the natural ventilation treatment of the Badgir system in way to produce a building-wide system of mechanical cooling to reduce energy costs. According to estimates, the Iranian-influenced badgir system cut electricity consumption for the project by about 70 percent. Additionally cutting costs is the building’s secondary metal roof that protects from direct solar radiation and creates an optimal ventilated air flow between the two buildings. According to the Zumtobel organization, the hospital design is the epitome of only sustainable and compassionate design, “The result involves the use of new and old technologies for cooling, air treatment, recycling, reallocation of local materials, landscape design and energy saving in an innovative attitude to perform architecture and sustainability in beauty. In addition in this case, really important result the role of the envelope in relation with the storm of sand that invested cyclically this area, better studied by the same studio in the project of the Salam Centre for Cardiac Syurgery, alwas in Sudan, in that they use the envelope end the external wall to filtre the sand, moving it foward the lower level in way to purify the air that then can flux in the upper level. In this case the sand that inevitably enter in the building remain stored in the lower level, that is uses as filter-level of purification.
Warm air output
Fresh air input
Dry sandy air input
Air treatment unit Ground cooling
Adiabatic humidifier
Filtering
2.3_ Examples in contemporary architecture Two project that we can’t not to quote, not specifically for their particular enviromental aspects, but above all for the technical development of the studies about the features of a evoluted envelope; are the Allianz Arena and the UK Pavilion realized for the Shangai Expo, respectively realized in 2005 and 2010. The Allianz Arena, by Herzog & de Meuron was one the first experimentation in this field and one of the world wide flagship buildings in ETFE technology an expression of innovative stadia and building technologies is the being one of the world’s largest membrane envelopes the structure consists entirely of rhomb designed ETFE foil cushions that can be effectively illuminated from the inside with light in the colors of the teams that could play inside it. The covering area of the building is split up in the roof consisting of two-layered white and transparent foil cushions as well as the façade with foil cushions whose outside is printed. Light of as much natural origin as possible is required to ensure the growing of the grass and lighting of the numerous restaurants, offices, kiosks and boxes. Consequently, a transparent building covering made of air-supported, two-layered ETFE-foil cushions was chosen proving a light transmission of 95%.
Likewise to the Allianz Arena, we can quote also the UK Pavilion, designed by Thomas Heatherwickfor. This building has strongly been criticized for his not sustainability post Expo use, however reenters in reality among the examples to enumerate, for his the reactive envelope. Unusual example of creativeness and innovation, the pavilion drawn by the British architect introduces himself as a structure of six floors entirely dressed by 60.000 acrylic transparent threads, long 7,5 meters, that stir together with the wind. During the day the 60mila filaments will act as optics fibers channeling the natural light toward the inside. During the night the artificial light of the inside spaces, actually conducted to the outside to the extremity of every thread, it will make to shine the whole structure. The structure will rise on a base that will extend him on the ground assuming the original form of an open paper that will seem to previously have wound the tent. The polemics are not missed, tied up particularly to the eco-sostenibility of the project. The composite acrylic of the 60mila filaments would not not only reenter among the eco-materials. Further element of confrontation would be besides the choice to box the seeds in the filaments that the wrap constitutes, in such way, they cannot be re-used anymore in nature, remaining traps forever.
Quotable also, in this contest, the Blur Building, instead, by the Diller&Scofidio Studio, built for the Swiss Expo 2002 on Lake Neuchatel. It is an architecture of atmosphere. The lightweight tensegrity structure measures 300 feet wide by 200 feet deep by 75 feet high. The primary building material is indigenous to the site, water. Water is pumped from the lake, filtered, and shot as a fine mist through 31,500 high-pressure mist nozzles. A smart weather system reads the shifting climactic conditions of temperature, humidity, wind speed and direction, and processes the data in a central computer that regulates water pressure. Upon entering the fog mass, visual and acoustic references are erased, leaving only an optical “white-out” and the “white-noise” of pulsing nozzles. Blur is an anti-spectacle. Contrary to immersive environments that strive for high-definition visual fidelity with ever-greater technical virtuosity, Blur is decidedly low-definition: there is nothing to see but our dependence on vision itself.
Ann Ha and Behrang Behin of Living Pavilion imagine a future in which nature is brought back into the city – not replacing its dense vitality, but adding some ‘green’ to the mix. Technologies such as green roofs and green walls will reduce heat-island effect and mitigate storm water runoff. Urban farms will provide nutritious locally grown produce to urban dwellers while making them more aware of where their food comes from. These developments will not only have a positive impact on the city’s environmental footprint, but will also enrich the lives of New Yorkers: they will add a new dimension to the urban experience, making possible new forms of spatial and architectural expression. Living Pavilion is a low-tech, low-impact installation that employs milk crates as the framework for growing planted surface similar to a green wall. Living Pavilion aspires to create a synthesis of form, structure, light and life. The pavilion’s surface is planted with hanging shade-tolerant plants that will provide an environment maintained at a cooler temperature because of evapotranspiration from the plants. At the end of the season, the pavilion’s modular design will allow easy disassembly and distribution of the planted milk crates to the New York area for use in homes, public places, and community gardens. Changing geographical context, we can come really closer to us, and talk about the 22@ district in Barcelona, Spain, an experimental district, with a mayor energetic load (District Climate), where the new values of the companies are intangible: they are not based in having natural resources of water, soil, gas, they don’t have real-estate values, retransmission rights (media Pro), they have patents (Indra), they have intelligence, programming and interaction (like the Reactable of Sergi Jorda from the Pompeu), a district, the way Artur Serra from I2CAT and the people form the 22@ say, an urban Lab. Is here where Spanish architect Enric Ruiz Geli designed the Media-TIK, this innovative building with a net-like steel structure, avoiding pillars on the ground floor, introducing the public spaces to the building. But the real innovation of this project is, above all, connected with his envelope. A highly personal creation of the Cloud-9 architect’s office, the building seeks to be iconic in the digital world and a vehicle for the dissemination of new technologies, while being designed as a socially open civic space. The building is in the shape of a cube and formed by large iron beams covered in a plastic coating of inflatable bubbles, which offer glimpses of the fluorescent structure of the building. The attractive covering also has a functional utility as a way of regulating light and temperature, primarily preventing 114 tons of CO2 a year from escaping from the building, and offering a 20% saving on climate control. Every facade of the Media-TIC is different: from the outside, they reveal parts of their interior spaces and give a diverse plasticity, while from the inside they offer spectacular views. The translucent and innovative covering, ETFE (Ethylene Tetrafluor Ethylene), recently approved as a construction material, is in itself an innovation in Spanish building: it acts as an external covering and a mobile sunscreen that helps light to penetrate and affords heat savings. The ETFE skin is activated using pneumatic mechanisms thanks to “luxometer” sensors that automatically and independently activate the chamber inflation and deflation devices according to how much solar energy there is. These luxometers are energy independent. We also look at which was the Media-TIC targets and achieves:1-20% CO2 reduction due to the use of District Cooling, clean energy. 2-10% CO2 reduction due to the photovoltaic roof. 3-55% CO2 reduction due to the dynamic ETFE sun filters. 4-10% CO2 reduction due to energy efficiency related to smart sensors. Total 95% CO2 reduction, the Media-TIC is a NET building almost a net zero building. 14
14_ from” MEDIA-TIC, WITH THE ALMOST-FINISHED WORKS, IS THE NEW IMAGE OF BARCELONA DIGITAL “, a document by ElConsorciBarcelona and Ajuntament de Barcelona
03. Experimentation of self selficient complex. Ideals and concretes challenges. Forest Suburbia is inhabited by self-sufficient tree-like homes Kimberley Mok. With its reliance on cars, propensity to sprawl out everywhere and annoying tendency to become storehouses of useless junk, suburbia is known to have a negative impact on the environment and on humanity in general. Fertile farmlands and forests are swallowed up by this beast, but it can change if we redefine our basic needs and what it means to live out of the city. Instead of cookie-cutter homes in a monocultural wasteland, Danish design student Konrad Wójcik envisions a suburbia where people live in tree-like houses that blend right in with the forest, calling it a return to a “primeval symbiosis.” Supported by a single pole, much like a tree trunk, Wójcik’s pine tree-shaped homes will accommodate anywhere from two to four people. According to FastCo. Exist, the four-floored dwellings would be outfitted with bio-digesters, heat pumps and a whole wall of solar panels to generate power, and they would be built with a timber frame, rather than with cement and steel. The intent is to reduce deforestation, and create homes with a low carbon footprint, which also have the possibility of being recycled or reused in the future.15 Zero-energy neighborhoods, such as the BedZED development in the United Kingdom, and those that are spreading rapidly in California and China, may use distributed generation schemes. This may in some cases include district heating, community chilled water, shared wind turbines, etc. There are current plans to use ZEB technologies to build entire off-the-grid or net zero energy use cities. BedZED was designed by the architect Bill Dunster to be carbon neutral, protecting the environmentand supporting a more sustainable lifestyle. The project was led by the Peabody Trust in partnership with Bill Dunster Architects, Ellis & Moore Consulting Engineers, BioRegional, Arup and the cost consultants Gardiner and Theobald. The project was also pioneering by being the first construction project where a local authority sold land at below market value to make sustainable economically development viable. This project is designed to use only energy from renewable sources generated on site. There are 777 square metres of solar panels. Tree waste fuels the development’s cogeneration plant (downdraft gasifier) to provide district heating and electricity. This last quotation had soaring ambitions to be a very sustainable, zero carbon development, but some of the technologies have not proved effective. For example, the originally installed combined heat and power plant which provided carbon-free heat and electricity from local street tree thinnings never performed well so was replaced by a gas-fired boiler.
SO... WHY QUOTE THESE?
IN ORDER TO HIGHLIGHT THE DIFFUSED AWARENESS OF THE ACTUAL SITUATION REGARDING THE CLIMATIC CHANGES AND ENERGETIC REQUIREMENT AND THE NECESSITY OF CHANGING IN THE BUILDINGS STRATEGIES’S SYSTEM.
15_http://www.treehugger.com/urban-design/primeval-symbiosis-forest-suburbia-self-sufficient-tree-like-homes-konrad-wojcik.html
As architects and engineers search for ways to make buildings more energy efficient and comfortable for inhabitants, focus turns increasingly towards dynamic building envelopes. Exploiting advances in technology, architects and engineers are becoming more and more ambitious about what the building envelope can accomplish. Not surprisingly, the most ambitious are striving not only to conserve energy but to harvest it. At Urban Green Council’s recent Author Talk, Russell Fortmeyer* spoke about “kinetic” facades—building envelopes that respond to outside conditions and the needs of the people inside. Citing examples of buildings with mechanical louvers, fortmeyer pointed out that the basic principles of sustainable architecture have been around for hundreds of years. We are “in a sense just rediscovering them and figuring out how to re-integrate them into architecture and engineering.” Speaking about early automated facades, Fortmeyer referenced two projects from the 1980s. The Occidental Chemical Center in Niagara Falls had automated louvers that would rotate to redirect sunlight during the day and close at night hold heat inside. Unfortunately the building was not appropriately maintained and fell into disrepair rather quickly. The Arab Institute in Paris had a southern façade made up of hundreds of light-sensitive diaphragms that automatically regulated the amount of light entering the building. Unfortunately there is some debate about whether this building “works (now), never worked, or always worked.
WHAT DOES IT TAKE TO MAINTAIN THESE HIGHLY RESPONSIVE BUILDINGS? WILL AUTOMATED SYSTEMS ALWAYS FALL INTO DISREPAIR MORE QUICKLY THAN MECHANICAL SYSTEMS? SHOULD WE BE OPTIMISTIC THAT AUTOMATION TECHNOLOGY IS BECOMING MORE ROBUST? Over the past 25 years, advances in sensor technology have allowed architects and engineers around the world to design buildings with a wide variety of building envelope innovations. Three recent projects of particular interest include: Sony City Osaki in Tokyo, Japan (by Nikken Sekkei, completed in 2011) – featuring a bioskin façade that cools the exterior of the building by running collected rainwater through ceramic pipes. Al Bahr Towers in Abu Dhabi (by Aedas, completed in 2012) – featuring a lattice of fiberglass triangles that move with the sun, to reduce solar gain and glare, and close completely at night.
16_ from RUSSELL FORTMEYER SHARES INSIGHTS ON DYNAMIC BUILDING ENVELOPES,Report by Camilla Camalandrei, U.S. Green Building Council
Design Hub, Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology in Melbourne, Australia (by Sean Godsell, completed in 2012) - featuring a double-skin facade with passive cooling system and outer layer of 16,000 glass discs, which pivot to block the sun. The discs can be replaced with solar cells when the technology is adequately advanced. The Hub has a large number of ESD features and incorporates strategies of water, waste and recycling management that are the equal of any ESD focussed building on the planet. In particular the outer skin of the Hub incorporates automated sunshading that includes photovoltaic cells, evaporative cooling and fresh air intakes that improve the internal air quality and reduce running costs. The entire building façade, in other words, has the capacity to be upgraded as solar technology evolves and may one day generate enough electricity to run the whole building.
Perhaps the most whimsical project is the recently completed BIQ House in Hamburg, Germany (designed by Splitterwerk Architects, ARUP, Colt International and Strategic Science Consult, completed in 2013), an experimental net-zero apartment that features a bio-reactive façade. The building grows microalgae within the façade that both shades the building and can be harvested to provide energy for the building, and these microalgae are cultivated in the glass elements that make up its “bio skin”. These are used to produce energy, and can also control light and provide shade. Inside, an innovative living concept is aimed at ensuring maximum design versatility for everyday life, and gives us a glimpse into urban life in the future. But also we can’t quotes example or new extremely advanced prototypes that are producted just by the Insitute in which we’re studing. We can’t mentioned these, not for a campanilistic feeling, but cause is a real focus and goal of the Institute of Advanced Architeture of Catalonya. We can skip over projects that are so obviously knowled in the architectural field to be been miliary stones of self-sufficient architecture sector’s evolution; like the award-winning FabLabHouse or the Endesa Pavilion, but we want to focus on prototypes in course of development and legitimation, created often from students and experted researchers in the field. One example between many ones, can be the prototype of a IaaC Student and a biochemist, that have created a proposal for a facade system which utilizes the natural electricity-generating power of plants. Consisting of a series of hollow, modular clay “bricks” containing moss, the system takes advantage of new scientific advances in the emerging field of biophotovoltaics (BPV) “would be cheaper to produce, self-repairing, self-replicating, biodegradable and much more sustainable” than standard photovoltaics.The system is able to generate electricity thanks to a type of symbiotic bacteria that lives alongside the moss. When moss photosynthesizes, some of the organic compounds it produces are released through its roots into the soil below. The bacteria feeds on these compounds, breaking them down into a number of byproducts - one of which are free electrons. The moss is planted in a “soil” made of hydrogel and carbon fibers that attracts the electrons and acts as an anode, harvesting the electrons to generate electricity. Mitrofanova’s prototype shown here was able to produce 3 Volts from an assembly of 16 modules which may not seem like much, but with the increasing efficiency of modern appliances the system could still be put to use powering, for example, a building’s LED lighting. Mitrofanova believes the system would be most effective in more Northern parts of the world, where standard photovoltaic panels are less effective but moss thrives. Or also the students at the Digital Matter Intelligent Constructions studio, always at IAAC have created a composite facade material of clay and hydrogel, which is capable of cooling building interiors by up to 6 degrees centigrade. Entitled Hydroceramic, the material utilizes the ability of hydrogel to absorb up to 500 times its own weight in water to create a building system that “becomes a living thing as part of nature and not outside of it.” Hydroceramic works due to the cooling effect provided by evaporating water. By absorbing large quantities of water, the hydrogel pellets that are spread throughout the composite material expose a large surface area for evaporation to occur, which both decreases the temperature and increases the humidity of the surrounding air. In turn, the material is therefore responsive: the cooling effect is greatest when the surrounding environment is warm, but when the surrounding is cool little evaporation occurs. Responding to the recent proliferations of “smart” materials and highly technological solutions, the team “aimed to redefine and embed ‘intelligence’ into the built environment by the use of responsive materials,” creating a passive system that responds to changes in its environment by leveraging material properties.
04.
Seen in the light of the excurs just run, isn’t able don’t notice how much results evident the pivotal role played by the limits in the application’s field of the selfsufficient buildings. The skin of the same, precisely, means as is undelined in the first chapter, suggests to us the indisputable assonance between the envelope and the reactivity typical of this latter one. The latest technologies in field, but also the history of sostainable architecture before and smart one then, bring us to consider the envelope, as the most incisive part of the building to make that the whole architecture improves its performances up to reach, at the first place, the goal to create zero-energy building, (also known as ZNE or NZEB building);building with zero net energy consumption, meaning the total amount of energy used by the building on an annual basis is roughly equal to the amount of renewable energy created on the site, or in other definitions by renewable energy sources elsewhere. These kind of buildings consequently are able to contribute less overall greenhouse gas to the atmosphere than similar non-ZNE buildings. They do at times consume non-renewable energy and produce greenhouse gases, but at other times reduce energy consumption and greenhouse gas production elsewhere by the same amount; becoming, in second place, a productive ones. Buildings productive of new energies for their contexts and for the city in general, generating a conceptual change that goes to invest the sector of the energy production, too often connected to the commercialisation of the same . Subsequently are proposed some diagrams of possibility, with the intent to share the techonogical opportunities that today the envelope give us, wishing to new directions, possibles, if released by the logics of capitalistic economy; for a more responsible and intelligent consumption of the resources, that as we know unfortunately too cleary, now results will be an Achille’s heel of the contemporary world , that daily develops under all the points of view, creating every day the future destruction of itself. Perhaps, today is this the concrete mission of the architecture, the essential aspect that joins the three Vitruvianis ones, previoulsy quoted: the responsibility in the creation of a global best future.
REACTIVE ENVELOP_ENERGY APPORT
FACADES-SYSTEMS
PASSIVE SYSTEMS
ACTIVE SYSTEMS
OUT
SOURCES = INPUTS
SOURCES sun wind water humidity temperature light use
ENERGY renewable energy geothermal energy solar energy wind energy cinetic energy dynamic energy
INPUT_D
OUTPUT_3
TPUT_1
INPUT_X
ENERGY=OUTPUT The whole building envelope becames a productive system, able to convert all the enviromental inputs in a energetic - output strategy.
INPUT_C
INPUT_B
ACTIVE SYSTEMS
energy for the distritc
(if +)
new energy net energy for the building
water for irrigation
(if +)
new water net
water for the building
(if +)
new energy net energy for the building
PASSIVE AND ACTIVE SYSTEMS Passive and Active Systems work together in a cooperative system, able to create a strategic network of new renewable energy’s cycles.
CYCLES
WATER-CYCLE
+ >
+
WIND-CYCLE - CO2
+
WASTE CYCLE
+
ENERGY CYCLE
>
FROM EARTH TO ENERGY
INPUT_D
OUTPUT_3
OUTPUT_1
INPUT_A OUTPUT_4 INPUT_C
OUTPUT_2
INPUT_B
FROM SUN TO ENERGY
FROM RAIN TO FROM WIND TO - ENERGY
WATER+ENERGY
An other additional proposal is to incetive the research in this field, creating places and events in that this experimental technique coulb became real. (ref.to Re-thinking Monumental Arena’s project_Urbiotica Course,MaCT 17)
REPEATABLE STRATEGY
REACTIVE LIMITS for a self-sufficent building, >>>>>>>>>>>but above all, as a strategy for selfsufficient neighboordhood > districts & cites
LIMITS _ REACTIVE SKIN FOR SELF SUFFICIENT BUILDINGS.
ASS.01_MaCT-19dec2016_SELF SUFFICIENT HABITAT a course of: V.Guallard,E. Moran_ student:Federica Ciccone