In Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA), the contribution from buildings towards energy consumption, both residential and commercial, has steadily increased reaching figures of 35% to 40% in the past few years. For this reason, energy efficiency in buildings is a prime objective for energy policy at regional, national and international levels. This research aims to provide design guidelines for buildings in Saudi Arabia taking into consideration the energy conservation principles. The proposed design parameters/guidelines are supported by computer simulation results of the software named “eQUEST” (Quick Energy Simulation Tool). This paper specifies minimum thermal resistance for walls and roofs, size and quality for glazing and performance standards for air conditioning (AC) systems.
The Ministry of electricity and water in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) reported (2013) that high temperature in summer months leads to an enormous increase demand in the air-conditioning electric load [. This work is aiming for investigating a possible mitigation to this critical problem. In this work, one of the Riyadh city (the capital of KSA) big mosques is identified as a model to explore the most appropriate ways to conserve energy since the mosques are established in dispersed locations of the KSA cities and operate simultaneously in prayers times. For the purpose of investigating several ways to reduce the energy consumption in these mosques, this study used the software named eQUEST (Quick Energy Simulation Tool) to investigate the effect of zoning areas, different types of roof construction, window glasses size and sunshield, heat transfer coefficient of the mosques walls, roof and windows, impact of insulation material and thickness. All of these factors help in reducing energy consumption in mosques and hence contribute in energy conservation and saving in billing costs.
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