Relation between energy consumption and window to wall ratio in high-rise office buildings in Tehran

Abstract

Development and expansion of high-rise buildings in Iran and the high energy consumption thereof have made adoption of energy consumption reduction strategies a necessity. Building shell and its various parts are the most effective elements in terms of energy consumption. Paying due attention to this fact, the authors of the present article investigate the relation between the window to wall ratio (W.W.R) and energy consumption in high-rise office buildings subjected to climatic conditions in Tehran. The eQUEST software was used to simulate the annual energy consumption of the considered base-case model. In this process, a 100% W.W.R was initially selected for the base-case model. Then, the research tests were conducted at W.W.R of 80%, 60%, 40%, and 20% both generally and individually (side-to-side test). The results showed that the window to wall ratio and annual energy consumption were directly related, i.e., a 20% reduction in the W.W.R could decrease the annual energy consumption in the research base-case model by 17%. Furthermore, the results indicated that the W.W.R affected the energy consumption differently at different sides of the base-case model and that in this respect, the building sides could be prioritized in the following order: south, east, west, and north.