Whilst there have been numerous categorisations of high-rise buildings according to their function, architectural style, height or structural strategy, historically little work has been undertaken to classify them based on factors affecting their energy performance — their shape and form, fac ̧ade, attitude to natural lighting, ventilation strategies, etc. These factors have been influenced by regulatory changes, developments in technology and materials, changes in architectural thinking and economic and commercial drivers. Develop- ments such as the New York Zoning Law of 1916, the postwar innovations in curtain wall fac ̧ades and the energy crises of the 1970s have all impacted on the way tall buildings of the time were designed and operated. These events also had a significant impact on the quantity of energy and the way in which it was consumed in tall buildings of the time. This paper examines the history of energy use in tall buildings, from their origins in North America in the late nineteenth century to the present day. In doing so, it categorises tall buildings into five chronological ‘generations’, based on their energy consumption characteristics
SUMMARYThe service core is now acquiring an increased consideration in the design process of a tall building, since it is responsible for a great share of its energy consumption. Nowadays architecture is required to design green buildings, and the industry of high rises is strongly infl uenced by the 'sustainable' movement too. For this reason, several researches have been carried out recently, meant to lower the energy requirements of the core as a whole and of each of its sub-components. On the contrary, little work has been done in order to assess its relevance on the embodied energy of the skyscraper. The present paper provides the author's defi nition for the service core, and analyzes the energy used by a tall building and the energy embodied in the materials during its construction. The author proposes several design strategies meant to lower the embodied energy of the service core. In order to assess the effectivity of alternative design strategies, the software Energy Plus has been used on a digital model of an existent building and on fi ctitious building having different core positioning.
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