Humanscapes Habitat

by Suhasini Ayer
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2021-03-09 16:00:00
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International
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11953 / EN

New Construction

Building Type : Collective housing > 50m
Construction Year : 2017
Delivery year : 2018
Address 1 - street : Humanscapes 605101 AUROVILLE, India
Climate zone : [Aw] Tropical Wet & Dry with dry winter.

Net Floor Area : 1 964 m² Other
Construction/refurbishment cost : 581 739 €
Number of Dwelling : 14 Dwelling
Cost/m2 : 296.2 €/m²

Proposed by :

Primary energy need :
7.14 kWhpe/m².year
(Calculation method : Other )

Energy consumption

Economical buildingBuilding

< 50A

51 à 90B

91 à 150C

151 à 230D

231 à 330E

331 à 450F

> 450G

Energy-intensive building

This building was awarded the Sustainable Construction Grand Prize of the Green Solutions Awards 2020-21 at the national level; and a mention for the same category at the international level.

The “HUMANSCAPES HABITAT" is an applied research and demonstration project of Sustainable and Integrated Urban Living for bench marking in habitat as a course correction for a sustainable and harmonious mode of development, an imperative need in present global crisis of energy and climate change. This mixed-use development of residences, community and workspaces besides being sustainable also wants to address the issues of skill development and capacity building of construction labor, who are mostly distressed migrants in India, to improve their economic condition and reduce construction waste in the habitat sector to meet India’s commitment to IPCC.

This habitat project has integrated five goals as part of the sustainable human settlement program:

• Sustainable built environment with solar passive building design coupled with efficient functional space layout to reduce the built-up area and use of low embodied energy building materials with cradle-to-cradle cycle with construction techniques that are low tech with lowered operational energy.

• Integrated environmental planning of water, energy and waste cycle, with zero-discharge of water, reduction and recycling of solid waste, water-efficient landscaping using local endemic species, and urban agriculture as edible gardens.

• Reducing point to point travel by integrating work and living spaces, using integrated community and IT infrastructure (ICITI) for work at home with clean mobility options like e- vehicles for movement within the local area.

• The human ecology, using the principles of “Cohousing” concept of living, facilitating interaction among neighbours for inclusive socioeconomic development with increased environmental benefits. A functional fusion the living, working, recreational and primary amenities allowing a multiplicity of space usage has allowed for over 15-20% in built up space reduction while the inhabitants to interact actively while working in the gardens and collective management of the food production and waste recycling.

• Establish a collaborative network of knowledge resources called ‘SustaiNet’ to facilitate further dissemination. This network will enable inter-institutional knowledge sharing and dissemination, a platform for academics, students and professionals to have an inclusive learning experience during and after completion of the project.

See more details about this project

https://www.archdaily.com/928779/humanscapes-habitat-urban-living-auroville-design-consultant
https://inhabitat.com/experimental-net-positive-energy-development-in-india-is-a-prototype-for-future-sustainable-housing/
https://www.aurovilledesign.com/humanscapes-1a/
https://archello.com/project/humanscapes-habitat
https://indianinstituteofarchitects.com/pdf/jiia/2020/Nov__2020.pdf

Photo credit

Photo credit: Akshay Arora, Auroville Design Consultants, The Drone Zone
Video credit: Fred Cebron, Hemant Lamba

Contractor

Name : Auropriya construction

Construction Manager

Name : Auroville Design Consultants

Contact : +91 413 262 2784

https://www.aurovilledesign.com/

Stakeholders

Function : Designer

Auroville Design Consultants

+91 413 262 2784

https://www.aurovilledesign.com/

Function : Other consultancy agency

Sunlit future

+91-413-2622992

http://www.sunlitfuture.in/

Function : Developer

Auroville Housing Service

https://housing.auroville.org.in/

Contracting method

General Contractor

Type of market

Realization

If you had to do it again?

If we had to re-do the same project, I would provide for more secondary semi-open transitional spaces between dwelling units to allow for informal interaction spaces and more private open spaces to encourage urban gardens for food growing. Inside the dwelling units, provide for more visual privacy as people live with open windows in hot humid climate limiting sound privacy. So, I would provide for more staggered openings of windows and doors in living and sleeping spaces.

Building users opinion

In the direct interviews carried out by the promoters of the project “Auroville housing service” 6 months after the apartments were occupied, the respondents were happy with the spaces provided both in terms of size and quality, the thermal comfort compared to outdoor temperature and humidity was also satisfactory and day lighting conditions were good. But several of them complained about the noise levels from neighbours, especially during the evenings and nights due to TV’s, loud conversations and music. Due to the high levels of humidity at the ground level in the night, the sound travels in the tropics and at present we do not have any tools to deal with it in building design without compromising on natural ventilation.

Energy consumption

Primary energy need : 7,14 kWhpe/m².year
Primary energy need for standard building : 30,00 kWhpe/m².year

Calculation method : Other

Breakdown for energy consumption : Hot water + ventilation + lighting = 7.14 kwh/m2

Envelope performance

More information :

Envelope is build with a mix of Poured Earth Concrete walls, Waste Cuddapha stone wall

More information

Electricity consumption from July 2019 to June 2020 = 14019 kWh

Real final energy consumption

Final Energy : 7,14 kWhfe/m².year

Real final energy consumption/m2 : 14 019,00 kWhfe/m².year

Systems

Heating system :

No heating system

Hot water system :

Individual electric boiler

Cooling system :

No cooling system

Ventilation system :

Natural ventilation

Renewable systems :

Solar photovoltaic

Renewable energy production : 115,00 %

The renewable energy system in the project is the use of photovoltaic system to generate electricity (16000 kWh) to the grid connected system.

Solutions enhancing nature free gains :

The project is in a coastal tropical zone with over 30°C daytime temperature and 50% RH for at least 300 days a year, the natural gain would be to trap, channel and enhance the flow of land and sea breeze within the dwelling units to ensure evaporation

Urban environment

The project is in a green field site, part of the township under development, so as such there is no public transport except for school buses, and buses for elderly and differently enabled persons. Most people use cycles and motorcycles with only basic access to shops that all lie within 3 kms radius.

Due to a low density of population, decentralized system of water supply and sewage recycling has been provided for. The waste is segregated on site with composting on site for the biodegradable and off-site sorting facility for recycling and reuse. The project is located along what is envisaged to become the main urban spine with shops, galleries, workspaces and residences. Some social amenities like libraries and health and healing centres have been developed and are less than 100 meters from the site, while the main food coop with the community and the dining center is about 350 meters away. So, the project is already part of a network of social and collective interaction spaces.

Land plot area : 2 825,00 m²
Built-up area : 49,00 %
Green space : 1 443,00

Product

Priya Cement

[email protected]

https://www.priyacement.com/

Product category : Structural work / Structure - Masonry - Facade

Portland Pozzolana Cement

JSW Neosteel

JSW

+91 22 4286 1000

https://www.jswneosteel.in/

Product category : Structural work / Structure - Masonry - Facade

JSW Neosteel 550

Plywood

Oswinply

[email protected]

https://www.oswinply.com/

Product category : Structural work / Carpentry, cover, titghtness

Marine plywood

Glass

Saint Gobain

[email protected]

https://in.saint-gobain-glass.com/

Product category : Structural work / Carpentry, cover, titghtness

Construction and exploitation costs

Reference global cost : 456 864,00 €
Renewable energy systems cost : 9 054,42 €

Reference global cost/Dwelling : 456864

Cost of studies : 4 741 €
Total cost of the building : 528 374 €
Subsidies : 528 374 €

Life Cycle Analysis

Eco-design material :

Eco Design materials

Walls : Poured Earth Concrete (PEC) wall, Waste Cuddapah stone wall

Roofing: Brick vaults

Floor insulation: Waste thermocol filling

Flooring: Natural stone flooring, Indian Patent Stone (IPS)

Compound walls: Rammed Earth walls

Wood works: reclaimed wood

46% of the global budget

Water management

Consumption from water network : 58,11 m³
Consumption of grey water : 52,00 m³

Water Self Sufficiency Index : 0.47

Water Consumption/m2 : 0.03

Water Consumption/Dwelling : 4.15

Indoor Air quality

Naturally ventilated with no air filtering and circulating systeming

Comfort

Health & comfort :

The health and wellbeing of the residents is ensured by (1) the fact that they live closely with the diurnal rhythm including the cycle of seasons as metabolically human immune systems function best when it is in sync with the natural climatic conditions. (2) Instead of adopting ASHRE standards of climatic comfort, we work with adaptive comfort model which besides being less energy intensive, allows the natural evolutionary capacity of the human body to build up resilience and robustness.

Calculated thermal comfort : Indoor temperatures calculations in winter/summer : maximum operating temperature during summer = 32.6 °C and minimum for winter = 26.8 °C, (natural ventilated buildings)

Reasons for participating in the competition(s)

Humanscapes Habitat project is an applied research and demonstration project in integrating climatic comfort – sustainable development technologies – carbon conscious lifestyle. The project is designed to bring together an active collaboration between promoters -planners – architects – constructor – occupants to lower the energy needs in a hot – humid climate with adaptive comfort throughout the year.