Relation between urban form and heating energy consumption

Abstract

The climate change and accompanying environmental problems have led different disciplines to think about that the natural resources soon start to run out. Rapid urbanization and industrialization and increasing pressure on natural resources have brought the concept of sustainability in urban planning discipline. Rapidly depleted energy sources threatened by uncontrolled growth have led to the emergence of new planning strategies and urbanization trends in urban energy efficiency and sustainable planning. There are many multidimensional studies in the context of urban parameters aims to provide sustainable settlements. One of those parameters is urban form, which comprises the spatial composition of buildings and open spaces in a physical texture. Theoretically, it is already known that there is a strong relation between urban form and energy consumption; but there is a lack of examination on existing settlements. This paper examines the relationship between urban form and heating energy consumption in different urban textures from Istanbul using the actual values of heating energy consumption to show up if the practical results are compatible with theoretical assumptions. It focuses on energy performance of urban textures and takes human behaviours and socioeconomic factors into account as another layer. Case study clearly un-derlines that the urban form of settlements creates a significant difference about the consumption of heating energy, while human behaviours and socioeconomic factors also have apparent impacts on it.