Sistema Regional de Información
en línea para Revistas Científicas de América Latina,
el Caribe, España y Portugal

As part of a thermal retrofitting process of existing housing, energy and thermal performance is normally predicted by dynamic simulation that supposes standardized patterns of building use, without considering the key role of the users in building's energy consumption. This represents a weakness in how the evaluation and design of retrofitting projects is structured, as integrally determining factors in thermal and energy performance are not considered. Integrated evaluations of the homes being improved will help to choose effective and objective guidelines. This work proposes a more objective and holistic evaluation that uses varied and compared techniques, involving the user in post-occupancy evaluation so that they provide feedback for the improvement's design. The integrated diagnosis comprises numerical calculations, onsite measurements, energy simulations and an estimation of the user's perception, with the goal of showing the different results obtained through the different methods. The study shows great differences in what users perceive and expect with the suggestions for thermal improvement obtained from the simulation. It is concluded that, to attain a higher user satisfaction and a better energy performance of the building, thermal improvement strategies must be defined not solely based on standards or previous cases but must consider the expectations of the inhabitants and including experimentally measured values of certain physical-construction properties to calibrate the dynamic simulations.

This is an investigation into asphalt binder mixed with different amounts of an organic waste containing coconut coir dust and residual short coconut fibers abundant in the Caribbean and tropical countries. The concentrations used were 0.0, 1.0, 2.5 and 5.0wt%. Coconut coir is a type of organic waste produced in large quantities in Caribbean region of Colombia. It is composed of grinded mesocarp, which is the fibrous husk of the coconut fruit, and is currently used in agriculture, ornaments and crafts. This waste is a very stable and strong material suitable for use in structural applications such as the reinforcement of composite materials. In this investigation, materials characterization was conducted using Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy and scanning electron microscopy to analyze the microstructure of samples. Particle size distribution tests were also included to analyze the short coconut fibers. Penetration, softening point, penetration index, viscosity, flash point, fire point and ductility performance tests were also carried out on the asphalt mixes. Overall, these tests revealed that asphalt formulations can be used in selected construction and building material applications.

In recent years, there has been growing public and private interest in Chile in implementing plans promoting the use of Building Information Modeling. However, the lack of local studies hinders the creation of policies suited to the particular conditions of the country. In response, we present a comprehensive analysis of the evolution of the macro-scale adoption of BIM in Chile during the 2013-2016 period, based on two national surveys conducted among architecture, engineering and construction (AEC) professionals. At first glance, the overall results coincide with other countries with similar development level, but a more detailed analysis evidences unique local conditions. There are dramatic differences in BIM expertise among AEC disciplines, which in turn leads to heterogeneous, fragmented, and non-collaborative BIM practices. Although BIM users account for more than half of respondents, they are mainly occasional users that only take advantage of the most basic capabilities of the technology. The study also shows strengths and potential opportunities for improvement. In the end, this study reveals the unique conditions of the technology adoption process in Chile, and consequently, contributes to identifying specific strengths, problems, and areas of action that should be addressed by any public or private BIM promotion plans.

Based on Life Cycle Assessment techniques, this research compares the environmental impact of 11 variants for the construction of roofs in residential buildings. Among others, the energy used, the carbon footprint and the waste associated to placement and packaging are found, leading to 9 sustainability indicators, which include socio-economic aspects such as the decennial maintenance cost, the maintainability ratio or the quantity of labour necessary. Each of the roofs was characterised based on 20 typologies of constituent layers, categorised under 6 construction functional groups, according to the function held in the roofs. Based on this study, it is demonstrated that the most sustainable roofs are non-trafficable flat roof with gravel finishing (with either a PVC or bituminous layer), followed by pitched roofs (with ceramic and cement mortar tiles) and green roofs with PVC layer. It was noted that trafficable flat roofs generate greater emissions of carbon dioxide and use more energy in their construction, and that flat roofs with gravel finishing require a lower cost of decennial maintenance. Furthermore, pitched roofs generate a higher amount of construction and packaging waste than flat roofs and require more labour, especially in the case of pitched roofs with tiles.

Prefabricated Modular Volumetric Architecture (PMVA) needs to combine industrial-made modules with limited dimensions due to transport restrictions to attend to programs, increase space, and generate forms. Different compositions change the position and quantity of structural components and require other attributes for the connections used to fix the modules and define the building at the building site. In this study, a connective model is proposed enabling multiple compositional alternatives along with the corresponding connective guidelines. Four generic connective sets are used to simulate and define the connective guidelines, and they are then applied to three types of prisms: rectangular, trapezoidal, and triangular. The methodology, which is based on shape grammar, confirms that the use of compositional alternatives with this system depend on the geometric and constructive attributes of the connective set used to fix the modules together. The compositional variation is therefore closely linked to a compositional-connective relation and to connective sets submitted to different degrees of adjustment. The proposed model opens the way for the industry to change the connective sets used and broaden the combinatorial capacity of chassis and thereby increase the capability for mass customization.

The optimization of connections arrangement to guarantee the anchored veneers with continuous air cavity stability is necessary, for better performance and durability of the façade. In this paper, different arrangements for the anchors to structure and different kinds of inner leaf are proposed, with the aim of selecting the best for the behavior of the façade against wind actions in cases of residential buildings. A very significant increase in stiffness is observed simply placing the anchors to the structure alternately to one side and the other of the structural element, and it is still more when there are wall ties between leaves, especially to a brickwork inner leaf.

Large amount of waste tires are generated progressively every year. Therefore, many researches have been conducted on using recycled tire products in several civil engineering products. This paper is focusing on feasibility of using recycled steel fibers from waste tires as reinforcement in functionally graded self-compacting concrete (SCC). Firstly, fresh and hardened properties of the normal and steel fiber reinforced concretes were investigated. After obtaining the mechanical properties of steel fiber reinforced SCC, 16 multi-layered beams were tested under 4 point bending test by considering various fiber fractions and layer thickness. Additionally, SEM images were used to maintain the failure mechanisms between steel fibers and concrete matrix.

The constant increase in the requirement for electric energy on the part of the service sector has driven the development of tools for the analysis of energy data regarding the management of buildings. Particularly university campuses are made up of buildings for different purposes and uses. Therefore, this work proposes to develop a method capable of providing clear and easy-to-understand information to track electricity end-use by means of two-dimensional graphs. The aim of the method is to analyse the data of the electricity consumption of one or several buildings and compare them with regard to their surface areas and uses, as well as to obtain a correlation with the outdoor temperature. The visual analysis of the building electricity consumption in the campus ‘Sciences et Technologies’ of the University of Bordeaux in France is based on graphs which include electricity use intensity, time series of daily electricity consumption, scatter diagrams of consumption versus heating degree-days, and boxplots for daily consumption profiles. This analysis permits characterising the electricity consumption of the different types of buildings and determining a trends of energy end-use in the short as well as in the long term.

Stone Mastic Asphalt (SMA) mixtures are susceptible to drain down since they contain more bitumen comparing to Hot Mix Asphalt (HMA) mixtures. To prevent this problem, stabilizers are used in SMA mixtures. Stabilizers are costly materials and needed to be manufactured with several processes. In this study, pumice and diatomite materials were evaluated to see whether they could be used in SMA mixtures as stabilizers. The optimum bitumen contents of the mixtures having different amounts of pumice (1, 1.5 and 2%) and diatomite (0.25, 0.50, 0.75 and 1.00%) were determined in accordance with Marshall design method. Then, the drain down characteristics of SMA mixtures at optimum bitumen content were found. Finally, the resistance of the mixtures to moisture-induced damage is analyzed by conducting the Tensile Strength Ratio (TSR) test. The results indicate that there is a high potential of using certain amounts of pumice and diatomite in SMA mixtures as stabilizers.

The present paper analyses the influence of typological factors on radon gas concentration in the cave houses of Crevillente (Alicante province, Spain). Despite their location in an area included in the lowest category of potential exposure to radon (according to the Marna Project), a radon accumulation exceeding the recommended values is obtained; room depth emerges as a parameter which increases the concentration found; small differences are also detected between interior and exterior temperatures (3°C), thus moving away from the usual comfort parameters and making it necessary to use additional air-conditioning systems so that these rooms can be habitable. Furthermore, the study of infiltrations reveals that the number of renovations/hour needed to reduce the existing radon concentration to 300 Bq/m3 is feasible even starting from very high initial conditions; however, the most restrictive recommendations (100 Bq/m3) are unlikely to be reached, since they imply over 13 renovations/hour of the whole dwelling volume even starting from relatively low concentrations.