Early stage design methodology to ensure life cycle sustainability of residential buildings

The work presented in this thesis evolved at the Centre for Territory, Environment, and Construction (CTAC), Department of Civil Engineering of the University of Minho. Scientific research has given overwhelming findings that environmental problems are a severe global threat, requiring an immediate response. In the years to come, ecological and economic constraints will restrain social conditions. Buildings play a fundamental role in controlling and improving both, social and environmental quality. Countless efforts are being made to promote and implement sustainable building design. New technologies to reduce resources consumption, low impact materials, standards, and guidelines, and building assessment methods are being developed worldwide. It is fair to say that despite remarkable achievements in promoting sustainable buildings, they are still behind expectation in enhancing sustainable design. When pre-design is poor or incomplete, the effectiveness of sustainable projects is compromised. Research shows if sustainability goals are established early in the project, against which to assess options of achievement, the success of accomplishing a sustainable building, increases. Nevertheless, existing sustainability assessment tools evaluate a selected option rather than allowing for comparison of alternative solutions. Also, the need for detailed data, inexistent at those phases, hampers its use at early design phases. To cope with this gap, this thesis proposes a new methodology aimed at supporting early design phases decisions towards sustainable design. It is intended to aid getting goals through a measurable and easily understood target for the building performance instead of prescribing a particular solution. To achieve such an ambitious goal, the work was divided into five main tasks. First, literature review was carried out on existing international recommendations for sustainable design and its assessment, and existing buildings sustainability assessment methods. This research aimed at identifying the stateof- the-art of such tools and standards, highlighting their advantages and drawbacks, and setting the basis for Early Stage Model for Sustainable Design – EasyMode. Then, analysis of the life cycle of buildings design was conducted. Complementing this analysis, Portuguese designers were surveyed to comprehend their understandings on sustainability and how they consider its criteria during design. After having the output of these two phases, it was possible to set approach and framework for the newly developed tool: EasyMode. After having a defined framework, stage four consisted in developing the calculation procedure of the indicators included in EasyMode. To validate the efficacy of the tool, a fifth step was taken; the tool was applied to a case study. EasyMode aims to support designers, through the decision-making process, at early design phases, towards successful sustainable design. EasyMode provides guidelines and concepts regarding the three sustainability cornerstones enabling setting early sustainable goals, making informed decisions, and selecting design options with better performance throughout the building’s lifecycle. EasyMode is intended to be easy and practical to use, so practitioners can make quick and expedite analysis, in fact making it accepted by them. This tool will endow designers with sustainability concepts in an easy manner, improving their knowledge on the subject and thus, improving their projects. Also, this work represents a step further in the scientific research in this field.