An intelligent adaptive skin from a biomimetic approach for energy consumption reduction

One of the challenges facing human beings today is the excessive consumption of fossil fuels, which has led to the depletion of non-renewable energy sources and greenhouse gas emissions, as well as global warming and climate change. This challenge has led to the search for solutions to reduce fossil fuel consumption, such as optimizing and reducing energy consumption and the use of renewable energy. One of the most important areas of energy consumption is man-made in the field of architecture. On the other hand, one of the most important parts of a building that interacts with the outside environment is its outer skin. In this study, the need to pay attention to the outer skin of the building, as one of the most important parts that can manage and control the amount of energy consumption in a building, has been addressed. Its purpose is to achieve appropriate and effective solutions to reduce energy consumption in the building by the adaptive skin. One of the sources of modeling is the study of the process of reaction of living organisms to their external conditions. In this research, general solutions to reduce building consumption in the field of outer skin as well as the convergence of challenges of a building skin and mechanisms in nature for survival are discussed. It can be said that one of the most similar living organisms to adapt behavior to the facade and skin of a building are plants. Because while they do not have much mobility, they have to manage their challenges such as receiving sunlight. By modeling plants, the challenges of using and protecting sunlight in the building can be managed. The method of collecting information and data from libraries and Internet sites and the research method is descriptive-analytical and simulation using simulation software and measuring its efficiency in controlling the entry of sunlight into the inside by climate analysis and light analysis software. By modeling the behavior of a special type of plant called Oxalis oregano and abstracting from it, a concept has been reached whose structural principles have been simulated by GrassHopper plugin in Rhino software 6. This module can be generalized on the facade and can control the amount of sunlight entering the building mass by opening and closing it. Transparent photovoltaic cells (TPV) are used in the body of the module, which in addition to providing energy for opening and closing the modules, does not impede visual vision. Examining the effect of the outer skin on the simulated space, it was found that these skins reduce the total heat load by 28%, reduce cooling load by 56% and the probability of glare from daylight by 23%. By modeling plants due to their static nature and adaptability to their surroundings, a mechanism in the building such as responsive skin can be achieved that control the impact of environmental variables such as sunlight into the building and thus provide visual comfort to residents in the glare of daylight reduced the use of building cooling energy.