Jaime Navarro

Climate-based daylighting analysis for the effects of location, orientation and obstruction

During the first stages of building design, issues such as local climate, surrounding buildings and orientation are determining factors. The impact of these boundary conditions on daylight illuminances in an open-plan office space is studied in terms of daylight factor, daylight autonomy and useful daylight illuminances. Climate conditions in the location determine the characteristics of the daylight source, such as the ratio between diffuse lighting and global lighting. However, surrounding buildings and elements which may block daylight in the space hold more weight than the orientation of glazed façades, but are not always taken into consideration in daylighting studies.

Optimization method for perforated solar screen design to improve daylighting using orthogonal arrays and climate-based daylight modelling

This paper analyses the influence of different perforated solar screens (PSS) in annual daylight conditions expressed using climate-based daylight metrics. The PSS design require parametric studies that are often complex and time consuming due to a large number of simulations. Hence, a new methodology is proposed to optimize PSS design by applying Design of Experiments using Orthogonal Arrays (DOA). A case study from the DOA perspective has been conducted, which involves an office space in Seville, Spain. The goal is to assess the effect of the following PSS design variables in daylighting performance: perforation percentage, matrix, shape and orientation. DOA results reveal that optimized PSS can increase daylit area by 33% and reduce over lit area by 35%, compared with reference models with no PSS. DOA method reduces the number of simulations from the 256 required to 16, so it could save time during the initial stages of building design.

Simulated acoustic field in mudejar‐gothic churches

The most significant acoustic parameters in a set of mudejar‐gothic churches were measured (all the churches were located in the city of Seville). From the analysis of these data important conclusions were otained about the behavior of the reverberant field versus source–receiver distance [J. Sendra et al., Computational Acoustics and its Environmental Applications—II (Computation on Mechanics Publications, Southampton, 1997), pp. 139–148] from Barron‘s revised theory [Barron et al., J. Acoust. Soc. Am. 84, 618–628 (1988)] and the relations between several acoustics quality descriptors: C80, D50, and RASTI [Zamarreno et al., Proceedings Acustica‐98, Lisbon (1998)]. The three most representative churches were chosen to carry out a computer simulation with the raynoise software. Absorption coefficient values used in the model have been adjusted using measured reverberation time data, and thus the results were obtained for the other acoustic parameters in the different octave bands. It was proven that, in ge...

Climate-based daylight analysis of fixed shading devices in an open-plan office

Office buildings consume large amounts of energy and are responsible for large amounts of greenhouse gas emissions worldwide. Among building energy efficiency measures, solar shading plays a significant role in reducing building energy consumption for cooling. This study analysed the influence of solar protection on daylighting of an open-plan office. Climate-based daylight modelling was used to predict such metrics as daylight factor, daylight autonomy and useful daylight illuminances. The results obtained showed that overhangs, and horizontal and vertical louvres have similar behaviours and sidefins have no relevance to indoor daylight conditions. In all cases, it has been proven that excessive obstruction may yield an excessive reduction in a range of illuminances between 500 and 2000 lux, increasing lighting energy consumption.

Sound Field In Several Theatres Of Cadiz, Before And After Its Restoration

In order to recover the historical and architectural heritage in our region, the Andalusian Goverment is carrying out since recent times a quite interesting an important project called Rehabilitation Plan of Theaters in Andalusia. This ambitious project, still running, includes the rehabilitation of more than thirty andalusian theaters, and inside it we are playing the role of acoustic consultors at the request of the region administration. Five of these theaters belonging to the the Cadizs province has been already rehabilitated and reopened for different uses. They are: Manuel de Falla Theater, in Cadiz, Villamarta Theater in Jerez de la Frontera, Principal Theater in Puerto Real, Olivares-Veas Theater in Arcos de la Frontera, de las Cortes Theater, in San Fernando. They are characterised because they cover a quite wide range of volumes (scene excluded), oscillating between 790 m 3 , in Olivares-Veas Theater, and 8114 m 3 , in Manuel de Falla Theater, and seats that oscillate between 221, in Olivares-Veas Theater, and 1221, in Villamarta Theater. This paper will be devoted to show the results, experimental and modelled, obtained for severals room acoustic parameters, before and after the perfomed restoration in the five theaters previously mentioned. These results will be discussed according to the diferent uses foreseen for these theaters and consequently the success of the restoration perfomed in them will be evaluated from the acoustical point of view.

A Proposal To Improve The Acoustics In Fernandina Churches. The Example OfMagdalena Church In Cordoba (Spain)

After the Christian conquest of Cordoba by Fernando I11 in 1236, small churches were erected in substitution of Muslim mosques. Thus arises the Fernandina church model which will become a church archetype after the Reconquest. They are simple churches, with three naves covered with wooden roof structures and domed apses that satisfied the needs of liturgy and preach at that time, in which music was enphasized over speech. Nowadays many of those churches combine their liturgical activities with cultural uses. In this work the acoustic conditions of this church model are studied. An acoustic analysis on one of these type of churches will be applied: Magdalena church, which has been recently restored for cultural uses. From measuring taken in situ together with computer simulation, architectural solutions are proposed to adapt the acoustics of the space to both speech and music use.

Acoustical behavior of churches: Gothic‐Mudejar churches

Traditionally, a particularly good acoustic behavior has been assigned to Christian churches. But this statement, which is not true at all, has led to important errors in church rehabilitation works, more so in those that implicate changes of use, such as auditoriums or theatrical halls, which is the case of many churches in Spain. This research group has worked in acoustical analysis for more than ten years, and has participated in many cases of church rehabilitation, among which is acoustical behavior. We are talking about a type of church very common in the south of Spain, Gothic‐Mudejar churches. They are churches with these common characteristics: relatively little volume, plants with three naves, and wooden ceilings. With this work, significant conclusions drawn from the acoustical analysis of ten churches of Seville that respond to this type are presented. Their characteristics are quite homogeneous, so it is possible to get conclusions about the acoustical conditions of this ecclesiastical type.