Alfonso García Santos

Determination of the influence of specific building regulations in smart buildings

The automation of domestic services began to be implemented in buildings since the late nineteenth century, and today we are used to terms like ‘intelligent buildings’, ‘digital home’ or ‘domotic buildings’. These concepts tell us about constructions which integrate new technologies in order to improve comfort, optimize energy consumption or enhance the security of users. In conjunction, building regulations have been updated to suit the needs of society and to regulate these new facilities in such structures. However, we are not always sure about how far, from the quantitative or qualitative point of view, legislation should regulate certain aspects of the building activity. Consequently, content analysis is adopted in this research to determine the influence of building regulations in the implementation of new technologies in the construction process. This study includes the analysis of different European regulations, the collection and documentation of such guidelines that have been established and a study of the impact that all of these have had in the way we start thinking an architectural project. The achievements of the research could be explained in terms of the regulatory requirements that must be taken into account in order to achieve a successful implementation of a home automation system, and the key finding has been the confirmation of how the design of smart buildings may be promoted through specific regulatory requirements while other factors, such as the global economic situation, do not seem to affect directly the rate of penetration of home automation in construction.

Variation of the surface chromatic properties of exposed concrete façades treated with anti-graffiti products

The research analyses the variation of the surface chromatic properties, hue and brightness, sustained by the Portland cement mortar support, due to the application of anti-graffiti protective treatments. The test specimens were digitally analysed using a methodology based on the RGB model, which resulted in the image histogram values of each test specimen treated. The same mortar type without protection was used as the base to quantify the modification. Surface chromatic variation is determined by the type of anti-graffiti treatment used and by the base material on which it is applied. The result is that all the anti-graffiti products studied cause the variation of the supports’ hue and brightness, with the mortar made from grey Portland cement type CEM II/B-M(V-L) 32,5 N (Mb) being the one with less variation of its surface chromatic characteristics once treated. In addition, the fluorinated acrylate component (A4) causes the smalles deviation of the absolute hue and brightness values obtained from the samples analysed.

Study of light‐multi‐layered façades

Purpose – Traditional facade systems are at the point where the minimum comfort guarantees have peaked, showing hygrothermic performance deficiencies which result in higher heating consumption, which is why it is necessary to make improvements in design and building construction, especially in envelopes, for which efficient building enclosures should be used, generating notable benefits. For these reasons, the study of new facade construction systems is essential, particularly light multi‐layers, which offer favorable characteristics for energy consumption savings. With this background, the main aim of this study is to generate knowledge to find out to what extent light multi‐layered facades are better, determining which facades are the most efficient and guarantee the comfort conditions of a building, contributing in this way to energy consumption savings.Design/methodology/approach – To carry out this study, a methodology of analysis was used, signifying that in the first phase a theoretical study has b...