SCENE TWO APARTMENT SUSTAINABLE DESIGN Elliott Chang

18 Beach Road Auckland City Central ecsrm.weebly.com

 NOT SUSTAINABLE

MAKE IT SUSTAINABLE

In this report I will be analysing a buildings performance in architectural point of view. This is a necessary step in understanding how efficient that building is and how it can be improved in order to become sustainable
and resource efficient. I decided to look at Scene Two Apartment. I chose this building because I am currently living here at the time of this writing and so I have some background knowledge of how this building works
and I can easily find the information I need at any time. I did not include Scene One or Three apartments because they have different floor layouts and I did not have access to those buildings. Scene Two: how much
power does it use? Are they used in a sustainable manner? What about water? What are its weaknesses, strengths and potentials?
 WIND POWER Gaining energy in a clean and sustainable way is mainly through wind and solar power. We could even consider using
the tidal movement since the apartment is so close to the sea without any private apartment buildings in the way.

13~51km/h

Lets assume that we can structurally put the wind turbines between the buildings and ignore any noise issue it may cause. How good will the performance be and is it worth installing? According to Level, wind speed
needs to be at least 12.6km/h to turn the big wind turbines. I did a quick search on Google to find the Auckland wind speed. The highest was 51km/h and lowest was 13km/h at the time of this writing. The direction of
the wind mainly comes from SW and blew to NE. The orientation of the apartment buildings is suitable to catch this wind. Wind is a viable option.

1 "Energy," Level, accessed May. 20, 2017, http://www.level.org.nz/energy/renewable-electricity-generation/wind-turbine-systems/.

 WIND POWER

75kW

50kW

17m /D
75kW
S2
50m

27m
13m

S2 WT

There are three high rises in Scene Complex and so there are two gaps between the three. The gaps between the buildings are 13 and 27 meters. I looked at how big the commercial wind turbines are and the old
ones back in 1990s needed to be at least 17 meters in diameter and 30 meters tall . They generated 75kW of energy a day in proper condition. One gap between the buildings is wide enough for this type of commercial
wind turbine. The Scene Complex is 50 meters high and since the buildings are so high up, it should be able to catch decent amount of wind energy. According to Energywise, average person uses about 8kWh of elec-
tricity every day. I calculated from the previous report that there will be at least 150 residents in Scene Two apartment. This means Scene Two apartment needs at least 1200kWh of energy every day. 1200kWh is
50kW in 24 hours. So theoretically one commercial wind turbine with 75kW output can sustain the electricity needs of Scene Two apartment

2 "Improvements in technology," Windenergy, accessed May. 20, 2017, http://www.windenergy.org.nz/improvements-in-technology.

 WIND POWER

1000W

415W

Small turbines could fit here. Per one: 5m/s 12m/s

Big commercial wind turbine might look odd in the city landscape. What if we looked at smaller wind
turbines? According to Energywise, smaller wind turbines need around 40 to 50km/h of wind speed to
generate the amount of electricity specified in the product detail . I managed to find some wind turbines
with specifications on Trademe. With this I was able to find how much power it can make wit the given
diameter size.
Wrchris wind turbine generator 400w 12v dc is 1.2 meters in diameter and generates up to 420W at 40
m/s. the maximum wind speed seems to be much lower than the wind speed that can be harnessed, espe-
cially because 50m/s is the wind speed in non-stormy weather.
Waveinverter 3500w 48v wind turbine with controller kit is 3m in diameter and can generate up to 3500w
at maximum 50m/s. at the minimum speed of 5m/s it generates 450w. After graphing it myself I deter-
mined that the power is relatively proportional to the wind speed. I later found that this is true according
to Windenergy that shows a relatively linear graph of wind turbine performance .
Dakota wind turbine is 1.87 meters in diameter and generate 1000W at 12m/s.This would then be higher
than 416w at 5m/s. I would use this wind turbine because it is small and it is relatively similar in perfor-
mance compared to the one above. I calculated that 234 turbines can fit into 24m wide gap. This is
234kW a day, more than enough to make Scene Two apartment self-sustainable.

3 "Small wind turbines." Energywise, accessed May. 20, 2017, https://www.energywise.govt.nz/at-home/generating-energy/small-wind-turbines/.

4 "Wind Turbine Generator 400W 12V DC," Trademe, accessed May. 20, 2017, http://www.trademe.co.nz/business-farming-industry/industrial/generators-power-supply/wind/auction-1328138643.htm.
5 "3500w 48v Wind Turbine with Controller Kit," Trademe, accessed May. 20, 2017, http://www.trademe.co.nz/business-farming-industry/industrial/generators-power-supply/wind/auction-1326041756.htm.
6 "Variable Generation," Windenergy, accessed May. 20, 2017, http://www.windenergy.org.nz/variable-generation.
7 "Dakota WT 1 wind turbine 1000W- made in Germany," Trademe, accessed May. 20, 2017, http://www.trademe.co.nz/business-farming-industry/industrial/generators-power-supply/wind/auction-1325458351.htm.
 SOLAR POWER

1200kWh
765~
1190

Full roof is not enough S2 SP

Solar is also an option. All apartments have north facing balconies. If we turn some of the balcony glass into solar panels, it will generate power for the residents to use if the wind is not an option. I analysed from the
previous report with Revit that this building gets 9 hours 39 minutes of sunlight in winter and 14 hours 38 minutes of sunlight in summer. This includes the moment of sunrise and sunset and solar panels do not get
enough photons during these times. I cut the sun hour down to 9 and 14 hours. Auckland gets cloudy very often as well so I halved the sun hour to 4.5 and 7 hours.

I used Trademe again to find some products and I decided to use Fazcorp solar panel as the example because it has the decent efficiency of around 19 to 23% . It produces 100w per hour with the size 540mm by
1050mm plate. If we install this on Scene Two, we can expect to get at least 0.45kWh in winter and 0.7kWh in summer. This solar panel has the area of 567000mm2. This is 0.567m2. Divide this number from 985m2
and we get roughly 1700 (2 s.f.) solar panels that can fit onto the roof. This mean we can get around 765 to 1190kWh every day from the roof space. I mentioned above that minimum amount of energy needed for the
residents in scene two is 1200kWh so using just the roof space is not enough to be sustainable if we want to go full solar.

8 "Solar Panel Flexible 100W," Trademe, accessed May. 20, 2017, http://www.trademe.co.nz/Browse/Listing.aspx?id=1328291128.
 SOLAR POWER

1200kWh

495~
770

Full balcony glass is not enough S2 SP

My balcony has 4.5m x 1m glass. One bedroom with one study apartment unit has 6.5m x 1m glass. Two to three bedrooms have 7.5mx1m balcony. There are thirty-four one bedroom units so it is 153m2. Twenty four
units with one bedroom and one study have a total area of 156m2. Fourty six units with the widest balcony have the total of 345m2 of glass area. This comes to a total of 654m2 of glass area in the North facing balco-
nies. Divide this number with the area of the solar panel and we get roughly 1100 (2 s.f.) solar panels that can be placed onto the glass balcony walls. This means we can get 495 to 770 kWh every day, even more if
we get more sun hours in Auckland.
 SOLAR POWER Scene Two is open for possibilities when it comes to power generation. I think Scene Two can have both the solar
and wind power since cloudy days tend to be more windy and sunny days tend to be calm.

2600kWh

1960kWh

1200kWh

Minimum Maximum Solar Panel

power power Maximum
needed needed per day for S2
Vertical solar panels Mix of solar and wind is ideal

If I use the entire roof area for solar panels, we can reduce the number of ugly solar panels that will be attached to the balcony glass. I will reverse calculate this to find out how many solar panel is needed per balcony.
If we subtract 1200 with 765 and 1190kWh separately, we get 435 and 10kwh. This is the amount of energy that we need to harvest from the glass balcony, assuming that we have minimum amount of residents in
Scene Two apartment and that the weather only provides half of the light during the solar hour. What if there were more residents? We can fit maximum of 326 people in Scene Two, although this is just a theoretical
number. In total we need 2608kwh of power every day with the maximum amount of residents. 2608 subtracted by 765 and 1190 separately gives us 1184 to 1418kwh that needs to be harnessed from the balcony win-
dows. From this calculation we know that Scene Two apartment cannot be self-sustainable if we cover the entire roof and balcony glass with solar panels. We should however know that this was with the theoretical max-
imum number of residents that can fit in Scene Two apartment. In real life the energy demand will be much lower than this. It entirely depends on peoples life habits and Auckland weather. If we want to rely only on
solar power, we need to cover the entire roof with solar panels and some parts need to be solar panel on the glass balcony.
 WATER COLLECT

98.5m2 = 40L everyday on average

NOT enough rainwater for 150~326 people

We can also harness water from the roof area. I was able to find the average rainfall data in the Shellypark website , which records the weather data from Howick in Auckland, which is very close to the Scene Complex.
With a 20.3cm diameter bucket, we get 4.1mm of water on average every day. I could calculate the volume of the water but the site did not specify whether the bucket was cylinder or cone shape. If it is a cone, it should
specify the dimensions but It didnt so I assumed that rain collecting bucket was cylindrical shape. The surface area of the bucket is 323.65cm2 and with the cylindrical shape and 0.41cm depth, we get the volume of
132.6965cm3 of water every day. We have 98500cm2 of roof area so we can have 304 times as many buckets. This means we can get an average of 40128cm3 of water every day, which is roughly 40L. This is simply
not enough compared to my daily water consumption of 126.5L. Collecting rainwater is not worth it.

9 "Rainfall," Shellypark, accessed May. 20, 2017, http://www.shellypark.co.nz/?q=node/17.

 WATER COLLECT

Ocean is the only watersource

at least 8 machines for being self sustainable

Sea water desalination is also another option. There is only one car park building in front of Scene Two apartment and so it is possible to construct a pipe network above it or below it and run it to the ocean. This means
we can get unlimited supply of fresh water assuming that we have the money to buy expensive equipment, enough to follow the demands of the residents. We have two options. One is we build one replacing the exist-
ing car park and sell the rest to the other buildings in Auckland. The other is we go with a smaller device for the individuals use. Reverse osmosis plant can filter up to ~100,000m3 of water every day . With the minimum
of 150 residents we need at least 19095L every day. The reverse osmosis plant provides way too much water but building a reverse osmosis plant is not a bad option either. Car park is unsustainable. If we want to
encourage sustainability, we would not have car park anymore and use that existing space to build the reverse osmosis plant, and sell the water to other buildings in Auckland. However we are not in any crisis of short
fresh water supply so this option is good when the existing water sources can no longer sustain our water needs. For now individual device seem to be a better option. The reverse osmosis machine from Wellington
site can provide up to 2448L every day . With my daily water consumption of 126.5 and minimum of 150 residents, we need at least 18970L every day. Divide this with 2448 and we know that we need at least 8
machines to satisfy the fresh water needs of 150 residents. The machine will cost $14240 in New Zealand dollars.

10 Auckland Regional Authority Future Bulk Water Supply Study: Conversation (Auckland: The Authority, 1986), 4.6
11 "Merlin Reverse Osmosis System," Wellington Water Filters, accessed April 9, 2017, http://www.wellingtonwaterfilters.co.nz/RO/Merlin.html.
 GREENARY & COMFORT

Barriers in ALL the balconies for

better privacy and sound insulation

Unused common space into greenary

A wall between two houses are poorly blocked so neighbours can see and hear each other. I put barriers on all the balconies for better privacy. The common area on the fifth floor is also almost never used. I want to
turn this space into a green space with trees so that people can take shade from the sun. This will be their own little park.
 Food Production

Timber constructed structure

with vegetable production

Some car park into

growing animals

This is probably the most important part of sustainability, being able to grow our own food. I already used the roofspace for solar panels and the public space could not be fully benefited from the sun becuase of the Brit-
omart car park building. So I designed the additional structures made of timber between the buildings. This way plants can get all the sunlight they need. I also think having car park in Scene Complex is bad because
cars are not sustainable and cars are stationery most of the time in the car park. I propose to use some of this space for animal food production. I did not use all the car park space because removing all of it is unrealistic
and growing animal does not need that much space depending on what animal it is, in this case I will have chicken.
 Scene Two can turn into a sustainable apartment without changing its existing struc-
ture. It only needs few components and some additional structures to be made into
the self sustainable architecture.

BIBLIOGRAPHY
Auckland Regional Authority Future Bulk Water Supply Study: Conversation. Auckland: The Authority, 1986.
"3500w 48v Wind Turbine with Controller Kit." Trademe. Accessed May. 20, 2017. http://www.trademe.co.nz/business-farming-industry/industrial/generators-power-supply/wind/auction-1326041756.htm.
"Dakota WT 1 wind turbine 1000W- made in Germany." Trademe. Accessed May. 20, 2017. http://www.trademe.co.nz/business-farming-industry/industrial/generators-power-supply/wind/auction-1325458351.htm.
"Energy." Level. Accessed May. 20, 2017. http://www.level.org.nz/energy/renewable-electricity-generation/wind-turbine-systems/.
"Improvements in technology." Windenergy. Accessed May. 20, 2017. http://www.windenergy.org.nz/improvements-in-technology.
"Merlin Reverse Osmosis System." Wellington Water Filters. Accessed April 9, 2017. http://www.wellingtonwaterfilters.co.nz/RO/Merlin.html.
"Rainfall." Shellypark. Accessed May. 20, 2017. http://www.shellypark.co.nz/?q=node/17.
"Small wind turbines." Energywise. Accessed May. 20, 2017. https://www.energywise.govt.nz/at-home/generating-energy/small-wind-turbines/.
"Solar Panel Flexible 100W." Trademe. Accessed May. 20, 2017. http://www.trademe.co.nz/Browse/Listing.aspx?id=1328291128.
"Variable Generation." Windenergy. Accessed May. 20, 2017. http://www.windenergy.org.nz/variable-generation.
"Wind Turbine Generator 400W 12V DC." Trademe. Accessed May. 20, 2017. http://www.trademe.co.nz/business-farming-industry/industrial/generators-power-supply/wind/auction-1328138643.htm.