GB2567539A

GB2567539A - Engen design principles

Info

Publication number: GB2567539A
Application number: GB1813378.5A
Authority: GB
Inventors: Pravinchandra Budhdeo Shamir
Original assignee: Engen House - FZC; Engen House F Z C
Current assignee: Engen House - FZC; Engen House F Z C
Priority date: 2017-08-16
Filing date: 2018-08-16
Publication date: 2019-04-17
Also published as: GB201813378D0; GB201713171D0

Abstract

A sustainable building design to reduce global emissions which can be applied to new buildings or retrofitted to existing buildings. The building provides a high surface area to maximize solar absorption for electricity generation. This can be achieved using a solar ledge which comprises photovoltaic (PV) panels around the circumference or perimeter of the building (figures 1-3). Alternatively solar tubes may be used, each tube having PV cells provided on an inner surface, and a refracting dome at the top of the tube and convex mirror at the base (figures 4-7). A heat sponge or thermal capacitor absorbs light to increase air or building temperature which is utilized in a heat exchanger and heat pump (figure 8). Heat is also recovered from waste water (figure 11) and/or mains water. Solar gain can be increased by the transparency of the building or by using dark cladding material or dark paint. Air insulation is provided by increasing the thermal barrier of still air around the building. The building reduces sheer forces from wind (figure 15) and uses a cellular design of the structure (figure 16).

Description

Shamir Pravinchandra Budhdeo

GPF Lewis House, Olds Approach, Tolpits Lane, Watford, Hertfordshire, WD18 9AB, United Kingdom (54) Title of the Invention: Engen design principles Abstract Title: Sustainable building design (57) A sustainable building design to reduce global emissions which can be applied to new buildings or retrofitted to existing buildings. The building provides a high surface area to maximize solar absorption for electricity generation. This can be achieved using a solar ledge which comprises photovoltaic (PV) panels around the circumference or perimeter of the building (figures 1-3). Alternatively solar tubes may be used, each tube having PV cells provided on an inner surface, and a refracting dome at the top of the tube and convex mirror at the base (figures 4-7). A heat sponge or thermal capacitor absorbs light to increase air or building temperature which is utilized in a heat exchanger and heat pump (figure 8). Heat is also recovered from waste water (figure 11) and/or mains water. Solar gain can be increased by the transparency of the building or by using dark cladding material or dark paint. Air insulation is provided by increasing the thermal barrier of still air around the building. The building reduces sheer forces from wind (figure 15) and uses a cellular design of the structure (figure 16).

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ENGEN DESIGN PRINCIPLES

FIELD OF THE INVENTION

The invention relates to building construction strategy, materials, technology and thermal design for maximising heat trapping and reducing energy loss by sophisticated use of different systems and their integration.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

EnGen Design principles are a culmination of design ideas that holistically give rise to unique design principles which moving forward will form the basis of all sustainable buildings, residential, commercial and public.

The term ‘sustainable build’ is undefined with many, many buildings declaring themselves to be sustainable. Passive Haus is the most widely accepted build ethos for sustainability. Passive Haus principles which are globally employed in modern building design work on reducing the energy required to heat or cool a building. Any heating or cooling is sought by ‘Passive means’.

These include;

a) Roof mounted vents which cause negative pressure to cause air circulation and remove excess heat.

b) Solar film on windows and transparent surfaces to reduce solar gain. Solar gain is the increase in hair temperature in a room caused y absorption of sunlight and more specifically the IR range. Brise Soliels are another example of reducing solar gain and therefore heating of a building

c) Superior insulation to reduce heat ingress and egress.

d) The use of sustainable, renewable building materials is advocated

e) PIR switches and energy saving appliances and fitting to reduce electrical consumption.

f) Use of Photovoltaic panels or Solar Heating Panels, building embedded wind turbines, air source and water source heat pumps and even ground source, geothermal energy.

EnGen House design principles are diametrically opposed to some key elements of established and accepted Passive Haus ideology albeit there are a few common elements in the EnGen Design specifications. The designs described herein are subject to detailed individual sub-designs as well.

What is EnGen?

EnGen is a derivative of Energy Generating. As the design can be used on any new building envelope and some elements can be retrofitted, no suffix is attached to the title.

The Foundation of EnGen is rooted in the definition of sustainability, which is the use of resource to allow growth of civilisation without depleting resources or altering the living environment for future generations ad infinitum. A typical example is over-fishing or overdevelopment of land which has contributed to the extinction of over 20% of the global bio diversity. So, land use and material use in the pursuit of civilisation is part of sustainable development.

The Basic Science

It is a scientific fact that is in 1-hour, sufficient electromagnetic radiation (energy) falls on the earth from the sun to power human civilisation for an entire year. Yet we still rely on fossil fuels which are themselves a product of solar radiation and gravitational energy (geological pressure). Fossil fuels are explored, dug out of the ground at great energy cost, transported great distances, cleaned or refined and then transported to the source of use. They produce pollution, are responsible for premature deaths and health consequences therein and of course ‘climate change’ and the financial and social costs therein.

There are many forms of energy which currently exist on earth. Fossil fuels are a result of geological pressure (gravitational forces) applied over millions of years. Sound waves, gravitational energy, kinetic and potential energy. However, for EnGen at present is focussed on harnessing electromagnetic energy. Following the logic that there is sufficient radiant energy falling on the earth, EnGen principles were birthed. Create buildings that absorb energy, insulate against the loss of this energy and make that energy useful for on-site consumption.

EnGen also looks to mitigate some of the energy forces described above. For example, gravitational energy expresses itself through the weight of a building. This is countered by having deep foundations of gravitational resistant materials such as concrete. Buildings also suffer due to wind forces especially towers, so logically it follows that aerodynamic building designs or retro-fit add on will reduce the forces to the building and using Newton’s Law, the resistive material and design to counter these forces. If you reduce the amount of material in a given construct, you are by definition using material more efficiently and sustainably. It is noteworthy that the use of aerodynamic shapes to mitigate or ameliorate sheer forces on tall buildings is not employed at present. Only the use of resistive materials and structures.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

EnGen Emission Free Sustainable Design

Reducing climate change gases such as CO2 and the pollution from fossil fuels is addressed in two ways. The operational use of a building and the embedded carbon used in constructing a structure. EnGen Design seeks to address both elements.

EnGen Design seeks to increase solar gain and electromagnetic radiation gain and create a light and heat capacitor. This is contrary to conventional thinking and conventional design in all buildings globally. Absorb all energy and make it useful or re-use it. It is staggeringly simple but surprisingly not adopted by humanity which is criminal given the damage we are causing future generations.

The electromagnetic spectrum causes materials to react when it is absorbed by the material. In most cases high energy UV radiation is ideal for photoelectric cells and lower energy infrared

1) Increase the surface area for absorption of Energy - Biological systems have through evolutionary methods shown that increased surface area is ideal for absorption or indeed loss of the item in question. In most cells, the mitochondria (the power unit) has a folded interior surface within a capsule like structure. The brain is also folded. The increased surface area provides a greater reaction surface for the mitochondria to produce energy for the cell. Logic therefore dictates that if a building is to absorb more light (think PV cells for an analogy), then more surface area is required to absorb light. At present, PV panels are roof mounted or in a flat matt on solar fields. This approach is intrinsically wrong as it does not take advantage of increased surface areas.

Moreover, horizontal solar farms which are widely used throughout the world have a long-term side effect IF used on previously arable land or viable land with established biodiversity. Horizontal solar farms block sun hitting the ground underneath their installation. In the desert, this may be advantageous to the intrinsic wildlife who are looking for shelter or it may alter habitat as a result of the man-made shelter spanning hectares of land. However, in countries where it horizontal solar farms are installed in fields, the lack of sun hitting the land under the solar panels, affects the top soil integrity. Soil is produced by a biological process and blocking sun from soil for 25 years (a typical solar farm install period) would cause significant degradation. Imagine putting a black tarpaulin over your garden for 25 years and the soil underneath would face significant deterioration.

Vertical solar farms are eminently more sustainable and solar panels placed on the entire fagade of a building, especially tall buildings would in effect create ‘vertical solar farms’. Vertical solar farms are not used in renewable energy installations globally as the costs of the vertical structure is greater than the cost of land. However tall buildings globally already have the structure and it is a matter of utilising this existing structure to embed renewable energy technologies such as PV panels.

An example of this is the application of solar panels using a solar ledge on a tower building. The entire circumference of the building is then absorbing light as opposed to the typical use of the roof. Recently vertical fagades are being utilised but the angle of incidence to the sun is poor and as such that overall efficiency compared to the use of designed ledges around a building circumference with the optimal angle of incidence.

The surface area is increased massively by doing just this. Figure 1 shows an example of two buildings with and without a solar ledge. It is clear that the building with the solar edge has a greater surface area.

Another example is to increase surface area by using solar tubes which are made of flexible thin film PV. Typical limitations to PV use are the angle of incidence and indeed the amount of reflection. Equally, surface area is limited in all buildings and this is the one of the biggest impediments to building integrated Photovoltaics being sufficient ot make all buildings emission free. The use of thin film closed pipes utilises an analogue of fibre optic pipes. Fibre optic pipes use the phenomenon of ‘total internal reflection’, where light is propagated down a fibre optic glass tube as the angler of incidence is so shallow that the edges of the fibre optic tube reflect the light through the tube with minimal loss of light.

The solar thin film pipes, use ‘total internal absorption’. Here the photon enter the tube lined with thin film PV via a refracting dome of fibre optics. The bottom of the pipe has a convex mirror. Light entering the tube will hit the PV semi-conducting material on the edge of the tube or shine straight down the pipe. The convex mirror will reflect the incident light to the sides on the solar PV tube. All photons entering the tube will be absorbed, hence the ‘total internal absorption’.

Photons of a particular wavelength interact with the PV thin film and IF they of the correct wavelength, they will cause an electron to be displaced from the atomic structure and pass through the semi-conductor to create an electric current. All the photons of a particular wavelength are absorbed by the PV thin film tube and as such the efficiency of the PV PER AREA can be increased 100 fold. This therefore provides sufficient surface area in any building to provide enough PV electricity to make a building electrically neutral in terms of energy consumption. Thin film is also significantly cheaper than silicon PV cells on a price per watt generated basis.

2) Heat Capacitor/Energy Sponge Designs. It has been explained that the principle source of all energy on the earth is the sun. Despite this simple evident fact, buildings globally seek to limit the effect of the sun on them.

Commercial buildings and offices use Brise Soliels or tinted solar film to reduce sunlight into a building in an effort to keep the building cool without using artificial measures such as air-conditioning. Air-conditioning is wrong in all aspects. Energy is simply being thrown out and to throw this energy out we are expending more energy. This in turn releases more greenhouse gases which accelerates climate change, creating more heat to throw out. This is a positive feedback loop with dire consequences.

The approach whilst intuitive is fundamentally wrong. If energy is available from the sun, let’s absorb it and make it useful. Create a heat sponge or a thermal capacitor to absorb light which in turn causes an increase in air temperature or building temperature.

The logical next step is to make use of this heat. Common heat exchangers can remove the heat and the heat can be used for hot water, heating or simply creating electricity. After all electricity is currently created by burning oil, to heat water to superheated steam to turn a turbine which creates electricity. The burning of oil creates energy to heat water. Currently low temperature energy is not utilised in buildings. A building can go up to 40 -45 degrees in summer even in the UK but this is thought of as a negative. This is free energy. For example, ground-source heat exchangers are commonly used globally. However, they normally extract 2 kelvin from the ground. This is then concentrated via a heat pump to 65 degrees to power heating systems in buildings. However absorbing heat from a building is not utilised. Instead the heat energy is expelled or indeed stopped via insulation. In hot countries around the world, heat should be allowed into the building and absorbed.

EnGen engineers prescribe designs which collect energy from the sun and make this energy useful. This is different to every single current building practice. Air-conditioning for example takes heat out of a building. A few recover the heat for hot water such as VRV or heat recovery systems, but this heat is used for limited purposes. EnGen sees all energy as useful and seeks to collect it. A typical example is energy contained in water from the taps and potable water as shown in figure 2.

3) Absorbing Energy from Water or Any Medium - Drinking water, water for bathing and showering etc., principally comes from water companies who in turn drawdown water from reservoirs or freshwater streams depending on their location in the world. The water is exposed to the sun. The sun’s electromagnetic energy is absorbed by the water. In the UK, cold water from the tap comes in at between 4 degrees Celsius to 14.5 degrees Celsius depending on the season. In Arizona, the temperature of the water in summer is 20 degrees Celsius. The specific heat capacity of water is 4.2KJ/Kg/K and as such if the in-let water is passed through a heat exchanger via a potable water storage tank, the water is chilled down to 2 degrees and the excess energy from the water will produce approximately up to 15% of the annual energy requirement for a building. This is exemplified in the Beacon, the first EnGen building in the World. In the Beacon, an estimated 285MWH of heat energy will be reclaimed form just the inlet cold water which has absorbed energy from the sun. Simple!

In the Beacon, absorbing heat from the cold water in-let source via a potable water buffer tank will reduce 28,000Kg of CO2 per annum.

70% of the earth is covered by water and the water is the largest electromagnetic absorber on the planet. It follows that using the energy from any body of water 1 is a potential energy source. Interestingly just removing energy 2 from the water by using a heat exchanger 3 would also serve to mitigate climate change as heat from the atmosphere is in equilibrium with the surface water temperature. If some energy is taken from the water, the atmosphere will provide heat to the colder water mitigating climate change. Simple really!

Figure 10 illustrates the above.

The same principle can apply to taking energy from air. Air-source heaters already exist. However, their application is currently limited, and their efficiency is reduced in winter. EnGen principles use the sun’s energy both directly and indirectly. To increase the amount of energy extracted from the air, EnGen air-source pumps would have them in-let pipes houses in black Perspex boxes 4 which would have vents on the underside.

Black absorbs infra-red radiation 5 and does not rely on direct sunlight. The black boxes would get hot and the hot air would be passed into the air source heat exchanger. The hotter air would allow more heat to be utilised. The exhaust would then be passed back into the black box, where upon it would be re-heated by shortwave electromagnetic radiation. It should be noted that the black Perspex box would absorb heat from the surrounding air even in the night as the earth’s daily solar gain is lost in the night and the black boxes will be part of the dissipation of the daily loss of solar gain.

Air-Source pumps 1 to be used and housed in a glazed solar gain vented compartment. Within the Beacon this is the atrium 2 of the building and the high glazed content 3 of the dwellings. Air-source pumps are used to pump in heat from the outside where the external temperature is above the median building temperature.

The advantage of this approach in air-source design is that IR electromagnetic radiation is amplified in a closed area of air. The air temperature increases allowing the co-efficient of performance (COP) of the air-source system to be higher as the compressor concentrating the heat has to work less and the input heat is higher.

Figure 8 illustrates the above.

4) Heat Capacitor Design - There are numerous ways to make a building a heat or energy capacitor as described below. Increase the transparency of a building to increase solar gain of the air within the building like a green house. This would include replacing slate opaque roof tiles with semi-transparent roof tiles with solar film.

Increase the insulation of a building such that trapped energy cannot escape. Therefore, energy expended within the building is trapped and utilised. For example, an oven in a dwelling will give off heat. In an EnGen design building the heat from the oven is trapped and used by the heat exchanger for useful purposes. Irons, computers, TV’s, kettles and even people sleeping give off heat and this heat is trapped and absorbed by the heat exchanger. Even heat from motors within a building such as water pumps and heat exchangers themselves is trapped and can be re-absorbed. As visualised in figure 9, the whole building then acts as a capacitor by trapping heat inside.

Current insulation levels are determined by building regulations. Overall insulation is limited as too much insulation and buildings overheat as they are currently designed. This is because the excess heat is not utilised. With EnGen Designs, the absorbed heat is useful and absorbed via cooling pipes in the ceiling or air-source heat pumps in flats. This allows any dwelling to become climate controlled as the dwellings can be cooled to the desired temperature and in the event of the dwelling being too cold, the cycle can be reversed, and heat pumped into the dwellings.

Human Powered Heating (The Matrix). Human beings give off heat. At rest the average person gives off at least 30W. More is given off during exercise of course. So in a tall building or office, with circa 200 people, in a given office day of 8 hours, 48KW of energy is given off. This is more than sufficient to run the entire hot water requirements for an office. However, at present, this energy is wasted and thrown out with airconditioning. In a residence with 200 people, just sleeping 8 hours would have the same cumulative effect.

Use of secondary dark surface cladding material and/or dark paint to absorb infrared electromagnetic radiation. This reduces the thermal gradient and increases heat ingress into a building which is desirable to create a ‘heat capacitor’. This method using IR heat to reduce the thermal gradient and can eliminate the need for complex ‘cold bridging’. This is seen under the solar ledge in The Beacon, where a simple black waterproof membrane.

EnGen design would fundamentally change design in hot countries. Typically, dwelling and buildings use white paint or cladding as this colour reflects electromagnetic radiation thereby cooling a building. EnGen would reverse this and seek to increase the glazing and insulation of the buildings. Buildings in hot countries suffer from extreme heat but also cold nights due to the lack of cloud cover at night. Hence insulation is required in hot countries. Insulation which is not used in hot countries would act to both reduce the ingress of heat (insulation stops heat from transferring across surfaces) but it would also trap solar gain allowing the energy absorbed to be utilised for hot water, night time heating and electricity generation.

5) EnGen ‘Air Insulation’ - Create Still Air Traps to envelope the building - Increase external building insulation by using thermally insulating materials and using ‘air traps’. ‘Air traps’ are created by the introduction of shaped materials or designs to alter the air flow to create a larger layer of still air thereby creating a thermal barrier as air in an insulator. The design of the air traps can be static of variable and also change based on the climate in the prevailing country of build and the time of year.

The biggest loss of heat in any insulated dwelling is the glazing element. Even using triple glazing typically provides only 0.7W/M2K in terms of thermal emissivity and resistance to heat transfer. This is twice current UK building standards for walls. Hence large windows lead to heat losses or gains. The only way to decrease heat transfer across glazing is to use air insulation, trapping still air pockets around glazing and preferably the whole building. Air is after all the biggest insulator in triple glazing.

An example of this is in the Beacon, the first global EnGen designed building. Towers cause vertical wind forces. Imagine wind from the end of a cliff top. Moving air, causes heat loss. Moving air around a building increases the heat loss from a building. Hence you feel colder on windy days. On all building surfaces, there is a thin layer of trapped air. The thicker this layer the greater the overall reduction in heat loss from the building or heat gain from the building.

Figure 13 and 14 shows the solar panel 1 on the solar ledge 3 on the Beacon. The ledge ‘lip’ 2 directs airflow away from the building surface increasing the amount of still air or decreasing the total air movement 5. Think of how a jumper works in trapping air. In figure 14, in the Beacon, the still air layer 6 is in excess of 1.2m or 20 times the air trapped in triple glazing 4.

This then leaves the issue of minimising vertical laminar flow across a building. Shapes can be designed and installed to disrupt vertical air flow or laminar air flow and increase the RO air static air layer around the facade of a building. This is detailed in the laminar flow wind break design utilised in the Beacon and show briefly below.

The objective is to borrow ideas from aeronautics and manipulate airflow to create a still air envelope 6around a building such as creating a vertical aerodynamic fin or shaping the drainpipes 7 to deflect air outwards. The use of a deep stippled facade is also an example of EnGen ‘Air Insulation’.

Air-Insulation is of course extremely sustainable as there is no energy expended in creating the insulating pockets (except energy for the shapes to trap air) and no material used in manufacture of the insulation.

Building facades such as in Fig 12 and 15, can be shaped to direct air flow back onto it-self. This counters wind speed and produces a larger envelope of still air.

6) Aerodynamic Architecture - This may sound ludicrous, but it is actually a sustainable design methodology ascribed by the EnGen design principles. All buildings are subject to sheer forces normally from wind. Tall buildings in particular sway due to wind shear forces. The amount of sheer force applied is a function of the wind speed and the surface area and shape of the building to which the sheer force (wind) is acting against. This force is resisted structurally by using more concrete or steel reinforcement and the use of sheer walls and cores in tall buildings. Foundation piles are also deeper as a result. This results in more material and therefore a less sustainable structure from an embedded carbon or construction perspective.

Logic therefore dictates that an aerodynamic shape of the building or objects/facades added to building to deflect wind around a building would reduce the sheer force and therefore the amount of materials used in the construction making the construction cheaper and of course more sustainable. An example of this is detailed in Fig 15 which shows a building 1 without aerodynamic design and the wind direction 2. In the EnGen design, curved shapes and facades which like a plane decrease air-resistance by redirecting air movement 3 around a building and reduce sheer stresses. EnGen envisages wind tunnel modelling of buildings becoming mainstay.

7) Re-Using Absorbed Heat and Waste Heat - Figure 9 shows underfloor or ceiling heating and cooling water-based system. Passing cold water through the same heat recovery pipes 3 to extract moving heat 2 and pass this through a heat exchanger can not only climate control a building, but the heat is utilised into the hot water and heating system and the excess energy passed onto turning an electricity turbine 1.

As depicted in Figure 11, reabsorption of all waste energy and building energy is accomplished by the use of waste water heat recovery systems so heat is recovered from rainwater 1, washing machine/dryer exhaust 2, dishwasher waste water 3, bath water 4, shower water 5, sink water 6. Also, heat is recovered from other sources like in-let fresh water (4.5°C to 14°C peak) and waste condensate from the condensing dryer, not to mention electronic and electrical appliances such as oven heat and heat from irons, by keeping the heat within the building and absorbing through the heat exchanger system for re-use 7.

8) Re-use of all grey and black water and absorb all embodied Energy. Water purification takes 6% of UK energy consumption. If the water is filtered on site and reused for flushing, irrigation, window washing, dishwater/washing machine use. Moreover, the water contains heat. The purified water is passed through a heat exchanger and the energy extracted as shown in figure 8.

9) EnGen Cellular Design - the structure of chemical such as diamonds and other strong material shows a cellular and uniform structure. However current building design is scientifically inefficient. Current building design is based on column and slab designs which increase the ‘stiletto effect’ of the column, concentrating pressure on a small area. This in turn affects the foundation depth and the amount of construction material used. Using a cellular structure as utilised in the Beacon, the world’s first EnGen designed building, we are able to reduce material in construction by increasing the surface area upon which the overall building load is carried. Through engineering solutions which reduce the dead weight of a building whilst increasing its thermal insulating capacity. Please refer to figure 16 which shows the cellular structure in schematic and compares the conventional building with a structural core 1 with the EnGen building with thinner slabs 2 and uniformly distributed walls 3 resembling a molecular structure.

The use of cellular design in tall structures has the following advantages

a) The whole building acts as a core. The walls on the leeside of any sheer force act as outrigger braces. This approach removes the need for a ‘sheer wall’ in a tall building and structural lift cores or cores. Normally towers are constructed from the core outwards. The core is jump formed or slip formed. Cellular design removes the need for this step and the material and labour for both the core and the sheet wall (which is installed to increase building rigidity)

b) Spreading of the overall load forces across the structure means that basement slabs will not (on normal ground) require supporting piles underneath the slab. This allows for basement creation in cities with public infrastructure underneath the ground, as the basement depth without supporting piles is considerable shallower.

c) Use of cellular design in basement car parks allows the supporting walls to act as buttress walls and slabs to act as bracing beams. This reduces the piling wall thickness making the structure more sustainable.

Claims

1) EnGen is a derivative of Energy Generating which is a set of design principles to reduce global emissions. As the patent design can be used on any new building envelope, some elements can be retrofitted.

2) The design of the Beacon will incorporate the maximum possible surface area for the given structure to maximise solar absorption for electricity generation.

3) EnGen design converts the whole building into an energy collector by acting as a thermal capacitor and utilises this energy for domestic uses.

4) Heat exchangers and air source pumps will be used to extract heat from the inlet water and atmospheric air to provide for heating within the atrium and the high glazed content of the dwellings.

5) Dark surface cladding material or dark paint will be used to trap heat by absorbing infrared radiation thereby turning the building into a heat capacitor.

6) By using aeronautical principles and manipulating air flow, EnGen air insulation design creates still air traps to envelope the building by introducing thermally insulating materials and shaped materials or designs to alter the air flow and produce a layer of still air which acts as a thermal insulator.

7) By using aerodynamics principles curved shapes and facades are added to the building which are designed in such a way that wind is deflected and air resistance is reduced eventually decreasing sheer stresses.

8) The underfloor or ceiling heating and cooling system uses all waste energy from the building by passing cold water through the same pipes to extract and recover heat from shower, sink, dishwasher and other devices such as oven, irons, electronic equipment, washing machine and dryer exhaust.

9) Grey and black water is filtered on site and re-used and is passed through a heat exchanger to make sure that all energy is extracted.

10) EnGen cellular design is based on columns and slabs which increase the stiletto effect by concentrating pressure on a small area and distributing the building load on a larger surface area resulting in lesser building dead weight while increasing its thermal insulating capacity.

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