On high-rise residential buildings in an oasis-city: Thermal and energy assessment of different envelope materiality above and below tree canopy

• Thermal and energy comparison for massive and light buildings: above/below treetops.
• Measurements taken in real apartments with and without resident behavior.
• Indoor temperatures below tree canopy are closer to comfort ranges (2 °C difference).
• Lower demand for HVAC below the tree canopy, with differences of 23–100%.
• Higher consumption for light buildings in summer and for massive buildings in winter.

Urban foresting can affect high-rise buildings in two ways from an environmentalist point of view because building envelopes are exposed to different conditions above and below the tree canopy. Two buildings were selected as case studies with massive and light envelopes. We performed thermal energy analyses in the apartments above and below treetops along with interviews of the residents in order to calculate the Predicted Mean Vote (PMV). A view of these cases clarifies that these factors greatly influence the occupants and their use of HVAC under normal conditions. Dynamic models are validated by the Energy Plus software and user incidents are excluded in order to evaluate the thermal and energy differences based on variables of materiality and height. These results show that there is variation in energy consumption during winter and summer according to materiality of the building envelope: massive building envelopes require more energy consumption in the winter; while, for the summer their consumption is less. In addition, we find that apartments below the tree canopy take advantage of the benefits of the microclimate in the oasis-city with indoor temperatures closer to comfort ranges as well as lower energy consumption for temperatures in both summer and winter.