Modern earth sheltered constructions: A paradigm of green engineering

•The design of an earth-sheltered residence in the Greek island of Kea is presented.•The prejudices against underground living are addressed by the design adopted.•The analysis of energy demand of the residence and a surface house is made.•The energy needs are more than 40% reduced in the case of the underground residence.

The utilization of underground space for the development of underground living environments is a practice yet to be commonly adopted from the general public. Although in the past there were examples of underground built space for residential use, such issue has been regarded as something uncommon, far from modern human design culture. The paper deals with the design of an earth sheltered residence in an Aegean island and emphasizes on the advantages of developing underground residences in terms of bioclimatic performance. The architectural aspects and the high quality of the interior of the living environment are presented in detail, followed by the assessment regarding the energy consumption of the residence. The latter is made through a direct comparative assessment between the proposed earth sheltered residence and an above ground structure of similar characteristics having state-of-the-art passive energy features. The findings show considerable lesser energy requirements in the case of the underground building with no apparent increase to the construction cost. Hence, the case presented shows a paradigm where the proposed construction offers a modern living environment with all the features of a green engineering design.