The world today is facing two kinds of crisis; the one is the energy and second is the land. Due to lack of land and increasing population, lots of skyscrapers have sprawled up and each one has tremendous power needs. The sustainable energy architectures can solve this problem fully. Since these skyscrapers are very tall, a lot of wind energy and geothermal energy can be harnessed from them using wind turbines on roof and water turbines on the ground. Here we have listed 15 of such green building:
1. Sun harnessing high-rise wins ‘Shenzhen 4 Tower in 1’ competition
Build for Chinese Insurance group, it is 49 story building spread in 1600 square meters. It has a stylish facade and beneath the outer layers, there are photovoltaic cells to harness solar energy.
2. Anara Tower – A 700m-high green structure for Dubai’s congested skyline
Built in Dubai by British Architects, this building has LEED silver rating and is working tremendously on maximizing water saving. It has provision of using renewable energy to cut short its whopping need for energy. It will have 125 floors with a sky garden after every 27 floors with shops, offices, markets and even a hotel.
3. Gesterbine self-sufficient skyscraper features a mesh of wind turbines
Built in greater Poland, the tower will have wind turbines on the top to harness the wind energy, human kinetics and water to provide for part of its requirement. Wind will power the day needs, while water turbines will run the pump to carry water from river to land. They have a plan to build reservoirs and plant trees for preventing soil erosion and ground water depletion.
4. The Strata: World’s First Skyscraper With Built-In Wind Turbines
148 m tall building in London has a nickname of Razor due to its trio wind turbines. English architects are expecting to solve out at least 8 percent of the energy need via the wind turbines. They have attached wind turbines directly on facade. The building is 42 floor high can thus utilize 35mph wind and wind flow from other building obstruction.
5. Spiraling solar-powered skyscraper helps cool the environment
It is an Eco-tower with gardens and a beautiful facade. It also uses solar powered cells to harness electricity for its daily use and has provision for collection of rain water. It will also have cooling units to make the building more greener and environmentally friendly. The architects have plans to build several such towers which will certainly reduce the global warming
6. Vertical Park: Stackable Solar Skyscraper for Mexico City
It is modular skyscraper with series of stacking units. It is solar powered and has sky-gardens, and it recycles all its water for reusing. Each module is in itself a small building with its own solar power generation.
7. Bahrain houses World’s First Integrated Wind Turbines
This is among the very first in Bahrain. The tower utilizes wind energy via the turbines and is expected to fulfill at least 10 percent of energy needs. It has three blades of 29m length and is expected to be working 50 percent of time.
8. Aviapolis Tower – A self sufficient, aesthetic and sustainable landmark
It is 70m high building with spherical crevices as meeting areas and garden. It is capable of harnessing both solar and wind energy. The tower engineers claim it to be self sufficient with array of solar panels and wind turbines.
9. Self-sufficient Oasis Tower feeding 40000 people
To be built in Dubai, the tower has sustainable residences and urban farming provisions. It will be having vertical wind turbines and a ETFE photovoltaic facade which can fulfill a high percentage of its daily needs. The farming area will generate sufficient food for 40,000 people. The tower top will be built in hexagram shape which will nullify the positive and negative effect to have a equilibrium.
10. Faceted Ecological Skyscraper incorporates renewable energy generating systems
The Madrid skyscraper will have facade fitted will solar cells and designed with folding solid panes to cool the inner climate of facade. This will also allow reducing the energy requirement. It will have residences, offices and hotels all built inside, so that people have to use lesser fuel to go meet the daily needs.
11. 10MW skyscraper in Dubai will feed the electric grid with renewable energy
The tower is equipped with a 5MW wind turbine, a 3MW concentrating solar system and a 2MW solar updraft system. They are even expecting it to send the residual electricity back to grid after fulfilling their energy needs. The south facing facade has 1600 heliostatic mirrors to collect sunlight and focus it back to the receiver attached to it via a mechanical arm to produce electricity.
12. BURJ AL-TAQA: Zero-Energy Tower for the Middle East
The proposed tower will use air conditioning using Iranian wind tower designs. The wind will sprinkle seawater between two glass layers covering the wall of the building. The ceilings also have special turbines to run cool water to cool them more. Built for the Middle East, the 68 story high building will have wind turbines and stack of solar cells with vacuum glazing technology to harness solar energy.
13. Food City – A self-sufficient metropolis planned for Dubai
Built for Dubai, the building will be a small city with aquatic farming, artificial landscapes and renewable energy harnessing. It will have solar cells on outer walls and roof. They also have provision of using piezoelectricity by using piezoelectric pad in pedestrian areas. They will also have methane generation from septic tanks and sewage disposal. The water will be recycle.
14. Self-powered Eco-Cybernetic City interacts with the surrounding environment
The conceived 150 story high building will be a live machine with bio-climatic walls for supporting vegetation purifying air. It has photovoltaic arrays for solar energy harnessing, rainwater and atmospheric water collection unit and will also be utilizing air flow between towers with aerogenerators.
15. 600m tall dragonfly wing designed for New York
The building inspired with dragon fly will have 132 floors and will have 28 agricultural farm fields to grow cereal to vegetables. They will have offices and residences between the orchards. The glass roofing and steel structure are there to ensure the greenhouse effect for the plants to grow even in New York winter. It will be using rain water and domestic liquid wastes to grow the plants and will have solar panels and wind turbines to power its own needs.