Enhancing building performance and automation deployment in Oman

Al Mughairi, Majid 2025. Enhancing building performance and automation deployment in Oman. PhD Thesis, Cardiff University.

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Abstract

Oman buildings encounter many challenges that cause increased energy consumption. To evidence this, occupants in Oman have identified concerns about soaring increase of electricity cost. They also indicated a high willingness to invest in enhancing their dwelling to save electricity use. In Oman, high building energy usage is caused by many reasons; some of them related to the types of building materials used, and others related to building practices that impact indoor environmental quality. For instance, using concrete blocks instead of Lightweight Expanded Clay Aggregate (LECA) blocks for walls impacts indoor environmental quality and causes low building energy performance and consequently occupants’ dissatisfaction. Concrete is known for its high thermal conductivity (1700-2500mW/mK) which allows high thermal transmission to building indoor that requires heavy use of Air Conditioning (AC) to maintain comfortable indoor environment. Oman buildings encounter many challenges that influence their energy performance. An example of these challenges is the lack of insulation in the walls and roof which cause thermal mass transmission to the building and increase the electricity consumption. Another challenge in Oman building is the use of aluminum single-glazed windows instead of double or triple-glazed Unplasticized Polyvinyl Chloride (UPVC) windows, aluminum is known for its high thermal conductivity which allows heat exchange between outdoor and indoor environment. Furthermore, windows and doors lack sealants and therefore they don’t prevent heat exchange. Additionally, excessive use of reinforcement steel contributes to building heating through heat flush from walls and roof. In Oman and adjacent hot countries, the practice is to use AC heavily during summer to reach a comfortable indoor environment because buildings lack insulations. AC ducts are commonly not insulated and in some cases the ducts are installed in the external walls facing direct sunlight. The challenges of building performance in Oman encompass issues that should be addressed in a holistic approach in each phase of the building cycle. For example, in design phase, building orientation should be considered so that rooms with more occupancy should be built in the opposite direction of the direct sunlight to reduce walls thermal mass. Furthermore, sustainable building materials, sustainable building method v should be embedded in the design phase. In Construction phase, the sustainable design should be implemented, and sustainable building materials should be utilized. For example, professional insulation could save up to 65% of the energy used for cooling. Building performance could be tackled in the post-occupancy phase without major impact in the building by utilizing building automation systems (BAS) which can be installed in existing buildings to control and optimize energy use post-occupancy. Towards this a literature review to identify building energy performance challenges was conducted. This was a literature review into holistic building performance across all building stages from design phase to a post-occupancy. It identified the key factors that influence building performance. Solutions for the identified challenges in each phase were suggested. Next, occupants’ feedback was collected to identify building performance gaps and concerns. This was achieved by a post-occupancy evaluation (POE) survey that was distributed to 105 occupants in Oman. The results of this POE helped to identify building energy performance challenges, understand occupants concerns and to find solutions to enhance building energy performance and attain occupant’s satisfaction. Finally, a case study has been conducted to measure the impact of BAS on energy use. The case study was a residential dwelling that has extensive documented energy use history prior to BAS deployment. The dwelling performance was upgraded in two ways; retrofit of building systems and deployment of home automation to control energy. The results of this case study have evidenced that, even though the retrofit increased the floor area by 114% along with a necessary increase in HVAC and lighting, the BAS provided energy savings, showing the potential of BAS to control and reduce energy use. The deployed BAS realised 12.6% of energy saving in residential building case study in Oman and has promising energy saving in many case studies as documented in this thesis. BAS has many applications where it can be deployed in residential buildings, commercial offices, and industrial use. vi To achieve this target, Oman building code needs to be improved to consider the use of sustainable materials in all building phases, consider sustainable building methods and measures and exploit BAS to enhance building energy performance, attain comfortable indoor environment and achieve occupants’ satisfaction. This will allay occupants concerns in Oman about the energy costs, promote the use of BAS and, most importantly, it will save energy and mitigate carbon footprint of domestic building stock in Oman.

Item Type:	Thesis (PhD)
Date Type:	Completion
Status:	Unpublished
Schools:	Schools > Engineering
Uncontrolled Keywords:	1). Building energy performance 2). Building automation 3). Post-occupancy evaluation 4). Sustainable building materials 5). Advanced nano-materials 6). Internet of things (IoT)
Date of First Compliant Deposit:	15 April 2025
Last Modified:	15 Apr 2025 14:30
URI:	https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/id/eprint/177709

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