An integrated approach and optimisation framework for urban form, microclimate and building energy performance in a cold semi-arid climate: The case of Kayseri, Turkiye

Toren, Basak ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9931-2375 2026. An integrated approach and optimisation framework for urban form, microclimate and building energy performance in a cold semi-arid climate: The case of Kayseri, Turkiye. PhD Thesis, Cardiff University. Item availability restricted.

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Abstract

Urban form influences local microclimatic conditions and building energy demand, but this relationship remains poorly understood in cold semi-arid climates. These climates combine cold winters with hot, dry summers, creating competing heating and cooling requirements within the same year. This issue is particularly relevant to Kayseri, Türkiye, a rapidly developing urban centre within a province of approximately 1.45 million residents. In Kayseri, 58.5% of households live in buildings with six or more storeys, demonstrating the importance of understanding the environmental consequences of high-rise urban development. More broadly, cities account for approximately 78% of global energy demand and more than 60% of greenhouse gas emissions. In Türkiye, buildings and services account for approximately one-third of final energy consumption, further highlighting the importance of improving the energy performance of the built environment. .However, existing studies generally examine urban microclimate and building energy performance separately, limiting the ability of planners to evaluate how urban form affects both local climatic conditions and building energy use. This study develops an integrated neighbourhood-scale framework combining field measurements, microclimate modelling, urban-adjusted weather generation, building energy simulation and evolutionary optimisation. ENVI-met and the Urban Weather Generator (UWG) were evaluated against field measurements collected in Local Climate Zone (LCZ)-based case-study areas in Kayseri to quantify how contrasting urban forms modify local air temperature and relative humidity and to establish reliable microclimatic boundary conditions. The validated workflow was then used to generate urban-adjusted meteorological data for EnergyPlus simulations to determine how form-induced microclimatic changes affect seasonal and annual building energy demand. A total of 3,360 parametric urban-form scenarios were generated across combinations of typology, Floor Area Ratio (FAR), Building Coverage Ratio (BCR), building height, street width and orientation to systematically identify the relative influence and interactions of urban-form parameters. Because heating, cooling, annual energy demand and summer overheating represent competing objectives, surrogate-assisted multi-objective optimisation was subsequently i PhD Thesis undertaken using Wallacei and the Non-dominated Sorting Genetic Algorithm II (NSGA-II) to identify Pareto-optimal and knee-region solutions rather than a single optimum. The optimisation objectives were Heating EUI, Cooling EUI, Total EUI and summer daytime air-temperature difference (ΔTa). The methodological innovation lies in coupling field validation, urban-adjusted weather generation, parametric energy simulation and surrogate-assisted evolutionary optimisation within one verified neighbourhood-scale workflow, rather than applying these processes independently. The results demonstrate that urban typology and density-related parameters, particularly FAR and BCR, are the principal determinants of energy performance, while orientation has comparatively little influence on annual energy use. For example, courtyard configurations generally showed higher Total EUI, whereas pavilion configurations performed better for heating and slab configurations showed lower cooling demand. Typological differences remained evident even at comparable density levels; for instance, Courtyard performed less efficiently than L-Pavilion at FAR 4.4, demonstrating that density alone cannot explain energy performance. Increasing FAR also produced a seasonal trade-off, with higher FAR configurations generally increasing heating demand while reducing cooling demand through greater mutual shading, whereas lower-density configurations allowed greater solar exposure. The optimisation results therefore did not identify one universally superior urban form. Instead, balanced solutions tended to occur at intermediate FAR and BCR levels, while the more extreme density combinations favoured one seasonal objective at the expense of another. Pavilion and slab typologies appeared frequently among the compromise solutions, reinforcing that typology and density should be considered jointly rather than independently. By translating these trade-offs into performance based parameter ranges, the framework provides a decision-support basis for evaluating development alternatives before approval, rather than relying solely on fixed density controls. Overall, the research demonstrates how an integrated, locally validated approach can connect urban form, microclimate and building energy performance to support climate-responsive planning in Kayseri, while providing a transferable methodological basis for comparable cold semi-arid cities, subject to local calibration.

Item Type:	Thesis (PhD)
Date Type:	Completion
Status:	Unpublished
Schools:	Schools > Architecture
Date of First Compliant Deposit:	3 September 2026
Last Modified:	03 Sep 2026 16:09
URI:	https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/id/eprint/189370

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