Relevance of demonstration projects promoting low environmental impact and high energy efficiency

Abstract

This work presents three demonstration projects, which respond to different environmental conditions, scales and functional requirements in Argentina: the Interpretation Centre of the Ecological Reserve, commissioned by the Government of the City of Buenos Aires, a single family house in Bariloche and the Biosphere Station Yabotí, centre for biodiversity studies in the Misiones Forest for the UNDP, United Nations Development Programme. The three projects were undertaken by the Research Centre Habitat and Energy, of the Faculty of Architecture, Design and Urbanism, University of Buenos Aires, within the framework of the Technical Assistance Programme for Bioclimatic Architecture. These examples demonstrate the feasibility of projects with low environmental impact, high energy efficiency, and comfort conditions achieved by natural means, by implementing bioclimatic strategies and integrating solar systems in architecture, and devising a programme to monitor and audit energy performance, thermal characteristics and user satisfaction.