Energy sustainable development through energy efficient heating devices and buildings
Energy devices and buildings are sustainable if, when they operate, they use sustainable (renewable and refuse) energy and generate nega-energy. This paper covers three research examples of this type of sustainability: (1) use of air-to-earth heat exchangers, (2) computer control of heating and cooling of the building (via heat pumps and heat-recovery devices), and (3) design control of energy consumption in a house.
Designing Estates for Good Cross-Ventilation in High-Rise Residential Buildings in Hong Kong
A habitable dwelling should be safe, comfortable, and adequately ventilated. In many densely populated cities, the housing demand of citizens is met by clusters of high-rise residential towers. When buildings are closely sited, the influence of adjacent buildings on the availability of cross-ventilation becomes a critical building design consideration. This paper reports on the results of computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulation studies on such effects based on estate models that comprised an array of building blocks. The result shows that cross-ventilation in buildings downstream of other buildings would be much reduced, especially when the buildings were aligned facing the wind direction and when the spaces between buildings were small. Shortening the upstream buildings and laying out the buildings in a staggered pattern would significantly improve cross-ventilation in the downstream buildings.
Strengthening human resources for new and renewable energy technologies of the 21st century
The UNESCO Engineering Education and Training Programme is currently focusing its priorities on postgraduate training of energy engineering students (although much of the output is suitable for advanced undergraduates) and working engineers requiring retraining or updating. To meet the needs especially for educational materials for developing countries and for distance-learning purposes, a multi-media “Learning Package” is in preparation which consists of a textbook, multi-media products and software for self-training and distance learning. It is intended to train students in the field of renewable energies with some dozen packages in preparation or for which half of the textbooks have already been published.