Investigating the correlation between the size of blocks in an urban complex and the annual cooling and heating load

For design of a residential complex, parameters are involved such as block size, shape, geometry, arrangement, etc. that affect energy consumption. The annual heating and cooling load of the building is one of the important part in energy demand. Proper design decisions can greatly save on current building costs and energy consumption. The purpose of this study is to find a possible relationship between the size of the blocks and the annual heating and cooling load of the building. The method of this research has been done in four stages. The first stage includes: library studies and extraction of definitions and factors affecting the size and arrangement of blocks, and also the annual heating and cooling load of the building. The second stage includes: designing a suitable algorithm for generating the size of blocks and different layouts on the site, examining the interfering factors and removing them, terms and conditions of the issue and simulating the heating and cooling load of each layout. This step was done by Python programming language and Honeybee and Ladybug plugins. The third step involves Investigate the correlation between the size of the produced blocks and the heating and cooling load. From the analysis of the correlation table, the results are obtained which are provided to the designer as recommendations in the design process. Correlation test indicates that in the study area, cooling of hot seasons is more important than heating of cold seasons. The strong negative correlation between cooling loads and variance indicates that the greater variety of block sizes in a set, the lower cooling load. Also, the positive correlation of cooling loads with elongation indicates that the more scattered of blocks in a set, the more suitable they will be in terms of cooling load. The present study is an attempt to provide a parametric model with the aim of reducing the annual heating and cooling load in the early stages of design.