Ecological construction copes with global environmental challenges and needs of the local inhabitant. Its motive is to ensure from planning to its actual use with minimum impact to the environment. It makes use of local and renewable material such as stone wood and soil. Such buildings ensure low energy consumption. Malaysian architects Ken Yeang and Tengku Robert Hamzah have come up with such as sustainable plan for an ” Ecologically-designed retail and commercial building” that has been designed for Putrajaya in Malaysia. The design, which has won the Holcim Award Bronze 2011, is an epitome of sustainable development.
The design is an amalgamation of sophisticated, more dignified and integrative eco friendly technologies which are most suitable for the superior quality usage. It is located on the main concourse of Malaysia which in itself is a planned city. It is situated 25km south of its capital Kuala Lumpur. This building is considered an an imaginative and first hand response to the fresh market building designs. The perfect mingling of high tech elements with the assimilation of vegetation gives it a huge space which in turn caters to the demands of the climate of the city. The building has two towers which are connected to each other by a bridge and a public atrium. The shape of the building is such that it gives extra space and a welcome ambiance to its visitors. A double skin fascia system constitutes a number of activities such as improving thermal presentation, providing good ventilation and attributes the traditional Malay design patterns.
To minimize the consumption of energy grading modes have been used while designing the lightning systems which meet the economic demands of this elite surrounding. While vegetation is done to bring in some green, wastewater is captured and processed to reduce freshwater demand.
The sustainable building design includes several environmentally friendly strategies to ensure a reduction in the building’s carbon footprint. The entire structure is designed and constructed to high environmental standards and thereby helps in conserving scarce resources such as energy and freshwater. Moreover the structure is built using materials which have low environmental impact.
Via: Holcim Foundation
