A study of the three R-type thinking in sustainable designs: assessing the energy efficiency through simulation in Australia

Energy crises and the continuous fluctuation cost of fossil fuels have moved researchers’ attention towards new sustainable and renewable energy sources. The three R-type thinking (i.e., reduce, reuse, and recycle), utilizes three great ways to protect the environment by saving money, energy, and natural resources. The Australian Building Codes Board is considered as a project for energy efficiency. BCA has also identified eight different climate zones within Australia. This paper discusses the climate conditions of the state capital cities of Sydney, Adelaide, and Perth that belong to the same climate zone 5 of the BCA. On this basis, the present paper covered three major aims. At first, we are doing to identifying the similarities and the differences in climate conditions in case studies, as a result of bioclimatic features. Then, the thermal performance of the “green roof“ was evaluated in all three cases. The simulation was carried out on a residential building block for one year (four seasons) using the Design Builder software. Finally, based on the findings of this paper, building orientation strategy was chosen to assess natural ventilation through BEopt V. 2.8 software on a residential building in Sydney. The results showed that the green roof in Sydney could be an optimal thermal performance, in comparison with other cases. Also, it can be stated that the findings of natural ventilation simulation show the most optimal building orientation in Sydney is 45 degrees to the southeast in which this among included 17% has better performance to improve wind flow. © 2019 Journal of Energy Management and Technology