Net-zero building design grammar for wide deployment

Entry requirements

Please use this Research Proposal, Personal statement and CV: GUIDE when preparing an application.

Months of entry

Anytime

Course content

The problem to be addressed: Structured methods for net-zero building design exist in the form of performance simulation based on the first principles. However, the use of these methods requires significant technical expertise and expert design tools. Thus, in practice, key design decisions are made by architects before or without the involvement of simulation consultants. The absence of rigorous building energy performance design results in suboptimum designs and missed opportunities for achieving net-zero emissions.

Originality: The originality of this research is in the development of a conceptual framework of design interventions for net-zero housing design and retrofit that translates each intervention into quantified contributions towards achieving net zero building performance.

Significance: The significance of this approach is in bringing net-zero design and retrofit of houses, that normally requires significant technical expertise, to a wider audience.

Rigour: The research will be based on defining a set of design interventions/design grammar rules and on rigorous analyses of these rules using dynamic performance simulation and multi-objective optimisation, until causal relationships between the grammar rules and their quantification are achieved for different climate conditions. The project will benefit from access to experimental evidence base at the University of Salford’s Energy House Labs.

Potential Contribution to Knowledge: The main contribution to knowledge will be in a replacement of specialist knowledge of building performance simulation with design based on a combination of grammar rules that achieves quantifiable net-zero performance and an expanded deployment of net-zero building design.

Fees and funding

This programme is self-funded.

To enquire about University of Salford funding schemes – including the Widening Participation Scholarship – visit this website.