Designs, Volume 2, Issue 3

The most important parameter in the design of the building envelope is the insulation thickness, because it dramatically influences the heating and cooling loads. The objective of this study is the investigation of different insulation scenarios for...

There are high numbers of remote villages that still need electrification in some countries. Extension of the central electrical power network to these villages is not viable owing to the high costs and power losses involved. Isolated power systems s...

It is well known that the major constraints to the efficiency of photovoltaic devices come from the generation of heat. In this context, thermoelectric generators have been proposed as a viable heat recovery solution, leading to an increase of the ov...

Concerning the robust model predictive control (MPC) for constrained systems with polytopic model characterization, some approaches have already been given in the literature. One famous approach is an off-line MPC, which off-line finds a state-feedba...

Most European cities are facing urban densification issues. In this context, a solution to create usable spaces without additional pressure on land consists in the vertical extension of existing buildings. Given their abundance in the building stock,...

A crossed compound parabolic concentrator (CCPC) is a non-imaging concentrator which is a modified form of a circular 3D compound parabolic concentrator (CPC) obtained by orthogonal intersection of two 2D CPCs that have an optical efficiency in line...

This paper presents the contemporary metaheuristic optimization algorithm named the Spotted Hyena Optimizer (SHO). The proposed technique is based on the law of gravitation and simulates the social behavior of spotted hyenas. The three basic steps of...

A crucial step in the biomimicry process is the search and identification of biological models relevant to the design challenge. Anecdotal observations from case studies in authentic business contexts, as well as emerging literature on biomimicry met...

Sustainable buildings are often considered expensive alternatives to conventional designs. However, a decline in costs associated with materials, technology, labor and whole building approaches make green homes realistic to construct even within low-...

This paper presents a low-cost temperature-controlled chamber based on the natural radiation principle. The temperature-controlled chamber assembled using a 1.0 mm thick aluminum sheet equipped with expanded polystyrene lagging material, temperature...