Climate and context adaptive building skins for tropical climates

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Climate and Context Adaptive Building Skins for Tropical Climates: a review centred on the context of Colombia Carolina M. Rodriguez and Marta D’Alessandro Departamento de Arquitectura, Universidad de los Andes, Bogotá, Colombia cm.rodriguez@uniandes.edu.co T: (57+1) 3394949 Ext. 4882 m.dalessandro10@uniandes.ed.co T: (57+1) 3394949 Ext. 2485

Adaptive Building Skins is a field of research that has received growing attention in the last few years, since it proposes to combine and complement both, active and passive design technologies into the building envelope. Furthermore, their designs apply principles of adaptability, transformability and evolution, in order to cope with the constantly changing nature of climate. Most of the research in this field has been conducted for the temperate and seasonal climates, characteristic of European and North American regions. However, little information is available on the application and viability of adaptive building skins for tropical climates. As emerging economies flourish in different countries of South Asia, Central Africa and South America, new opportunities for the use of these types of building envelopes start to materialise. This paper presents a structured literature and case-studies review of current developments in the field, with particular attention to the Colombian context. The distinct geographical features of Colombia allow the existence of a great diversity of climates. Traditionally, these conditions have influenced the development of different passive design strategies for building skins. This paper concludes with a reflection on arising opportunities, where existing methods can be combined and enhanced with alternative concepts that respond to local and available recourses. Keywords: building skin, façade, kinetic, adaptive, envelope, climate. What are Climate and Context Adaptive Building Skins? The term ‘building skin’, as used in this paper, describes the building enclosure, envelope, wrap, cover, shell or cladding, whilst placing emphasis on its association with the protective and responsive nature of the human skin1. For centuries, designers have tried to emulate adaptive characteristics in the building skin to improve indoor living conditions. In addition, since the 1970s and 1980s, energy considerations and climate change have constituted a great driving force behind new developments in the facade and roofing industry. A variety of building components began to be introduced within the building skin to assist maintaining an appropriate balance between optimum interior conditions and environmental performance by reacting in a controlled and holistic manner to changes in external or internal environments and to occupant intervention (Perino, 2008). Currently, there is a general consent that the Earth’s climate is changing and the policies on energy management are tightening, hence the design of buildings needs to take adaptability into consideration in order to cope with the challenges ahead (Gething, 2010). However, different studies argue that there are no common legislative or strategic planning frameworks in place to guide the design or evaluation of climate adaptation in buildings, either at a regional or at an international level (Malay, The skin is provided with temperature-regulation mechanisms, which allow precise control of energy loss by radiation, convection and conduction. In addition, it constantly changes permeability and pigmentation to prevent excessive entry or loss of fluids and protects us from sunlight, harmful bacteria and pollutants (Lupton, 2002).

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Climate and context adaptive building skins for tropical climates by Carolina (Stevenson) Rodriguez - Issuu