GREEN BUILDING DESIGN

What is a positive energy building (BEPOS ®)?

Currently, a house that complies with RT 2012 (a French regulation) consumes between 50 kWhep/m²/year for its heating, air conditioning (when allowed), hot water production, lighting and auxiliaries (fan and pump motors). Eventually, it will be positive energy.

A positive energy building is an ecological building whose annual energy balance shows a local production higher than its consumption.

Alain GARNIER, founder of the design office of the same name in Reims, has written a reference book on the subject: “Le bâtiment à énergie positive, Comment maîtriser l’énergie dans l’habitat ?” published by Eyrolles, “L’efficacité énergétique du bâtiment” collection.

Available here: Le bâtiment à énergie positive

The design of green buildings is at the heart of PHOSPHORIS’ DNA: by positioning itself as a passive building design office, it affirms its desire to integrate bioclimatic and sustainable precepts into each of its projects.

The PHOSPHORIS design office meets the certification expectations expressed by the project owners: regulatory level (RT2012), BEPOS label, PASSIVHAUS label, etc.

Future building will integrate a share of renewable energy: indirect (passive architecture for example), direct (biomass, solar photovoltaic for example) and recovery of a share of the generated fatal energy (waste water for example).

Several levels of efficiency

• Since 2008, to obtain a building permit, new buildings could not exceed 150 kWh/m²/year,
• Buildings classified as THPE (Very High Energy Performance) were limited to 120 kWh/m²/year,
• Since 2012, the buildings are at least at the level of BBC 2005 (Low Energy Building) they cannot exceed 50 kWh/m²/year on average,
• Passive buildings BEPAS 15 kWh/m²/year,
• The positive energy buildings BEPOS = BEPAS (15 kWh/m²/year) minus the energy production.

Thermal regulation

The thermal regulation RT2012 was implemented in 2010 and imposes for any French new construction a primary energy consumption of 50 kWh/m²/year: as a result, the energy consumption has been divided up to 4 times and the heating and cooling needs up to three times compared to the threshold of the 1980s.

kWh/m²/year = kilowatt hours of energy consumed per m² per year.

Energy consumption

Consumption for the 5 “regulatory” uses: Heating, Air conditioning, Ventilation, Domestic hot water production, Lighting and Auxiliary motors.

It should be noted that this consumption is calculated using the ThBCE rules. The hourly calculation is a dynamic simulation of the building and equipment behavior. It integrates “standard” occupancy profiles. In fact, this “normalized” consumption differs from the real consumption measured, because the latter results from the real occupation, the effective settings, and includes other consumptions (e.g. electrical consumption related to office automation, household appliances, etc.).