For centuries people living in hot climates have tried to cool buildings without electricity. Long before air conditioning, architecture itself acted as the cooling system. It’s called using passive energy. In Iran, for example, traditional homes used wind catchers, known as badgirs, tall towers that captured breezes and funneled cooler air down into homes. These passive ventilation systems have been used for thousands of years across the Middle East and can naturally cool buildings by directing airflow and expelling hot air.

In hot climates like the Middle East and North Africa, homes were also designed around inner courtyards with pools and shaded gardens, allowing for privacy, but also for cool air to circulate through thick mud-brick walls and shaded spaces during the day. In some cases, underground spaces connected to aqueducts or water channels were used to further cool incoming air before it entered the building.

Modern sustainable architecture has tried to rediscover these ancient ideas. Over the years we have covered everything from white roof paint that reflects sunlight to experimental passive cooling materials designed to reduce air-conditioning demand.

Now an Israeli startup says it may have taken the idea a step further: cooling surfaces using sunlight itself.

SolCold, a climate-tech company based in Ness Ziona, Israel, has developed a nanotechnology coating that actively cools surfaces when exposed to sunlight. The company was founded in 2016 by Yaron Shenhav and Dr. Yaron Shenhav (co-founder and CEO), based on research originating at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

The coating can be applied to buildings, vehicles, shipping containers and even fabrics. When sunlight hits the material, it triggers a physical process that reflects most solar radiation, converts absorbed heat energy into light, and releases heat through radiative cooling. Sort of the way you cool down after you pop into the water and then stand in the air.

Unlike traditional reflective coatings or “cool roof” paints, which simply bounce sunlight away, SolCold’s technology actively removes heat from the surface. In direct sunlight, coated objects can become cooler than the surrounding air.

The hotter the environment and the stronger the sun, the stronger the cooling effect. In laboratory tests the coating has demonstrated temperature reductions of up to about 20°C below ambient conditions.

The company says the technology could significantly reduce air-conditioning demand in buildings, cut energy use in refrigerated shipping containers, and help lower the urban heat island effect that traps heat in cities.

SolCold has raised several million dollars in venture funding, with investors including the Israel Innovation Authority and private climate-tech investors, and has conducted dozens of pilot projects with global automotive and industrial companies, testing the coating on vehicles and equipment exposed to intense sunlight. Major global manufacturers have reportedly tested the technology for use on vehicles and industrial equipment exposed to heat.

The company is entering a growing field of passive cooling and reflective materials, competing with technologies such as cool roof coatings from companies like Cool Roof Rating Council partners, radiative cooling materials developed at Stanford and MIT, and reflective paints such as those commercialized by PPG and other building-materials manufacturers.

Its first product named “Glacier 110,” is an opaque, white solid film with a thickness of 350 µm, an area density of 0.3 kg/m_2, and is highly durable, lasting for ten years in high-performance applications. The material’s optimal cooling power is 70W/m₂ – 170 W/m₂ at noon in summertime. It can be used on buses to keep occupants cool, for instance.

Glacier 110 has four layers: a smart filter that lets 1% of heat pass through it, an anti-stokes layer, a radiative cooling layer, and a mirror layer. The coating maintains a low ambient temperature throughout its entire architecture.

The main benefits of the company’s innovative products include zero electricity and fuel consumption and zero carbon emissions. Used in clothing, it protects the health of the wearer.

If the technology scales commercially, coatings that turn sunlight into cooling power could offer a modern, high-tech counterpart to the ancient passive cooling systems that shaped desert architecture for centuries.

The post SolCold wants to cool buildings using sunlight appeared first on Green Prophet.

People in the Middle East have understood that privacy and protection from the intense heat outside go hand in hand. The mashrabiya is an ancient Arab invention to passively cool buildings and keep strangers from looking in. But not all of us can invest in architecture additions. Or frosted glass. And when there is a heat way or instant privacy needed, no need to go far. You can use a Scandinavian trick that puts a few coats of yoghurt on your windows to create a fritted or frosted glass appearance.

The yoghurt is easy to apply with a small roller brush, it doesn’t smell, it doesn’t attract insects, it doesn’t degrade and it can be washed off simply with a cloth and water once the heatwave (or your privacy issues) are over. It’s a also a cheap and easy solution if you are renting or are allergic to dust from heat blocking curtains.

This is one of many cooling DIY solutions. You can also plant moss if you want to grow some more passive insulation on the side of your home. 

How to make yoghurt-coated frosted glass:

1. Buy sugar free Greek yoghurt – the higher the fat content the better. Oak yoghurt works. If you use a lower fat content, the effect will be more opaque.
2. Map out section of window that you want to frost. You can take out straight lines, heart shapes, or buy stickers or stencils to map out your design.

1. Roll on 2 or 3 coats of yoghurt on the inside of your window. (You can also use the exterior side if you live in an area that doesn’t get extensive rain.) It is possible to dab on the yoghurt with a sponge.
2. When dry and you have achieved your desired effect, pull away your tape and stencils and voila!
3. When dry you can scratch out designs as well using a hard piece of plastic like an old credit card.

If you want a more permanent solution, you can use acrylic paint to “frost” the glass but this is harder to remove. The previous owners of the house I bought self-frosted the bathroom windows in my bathroom this way and it is impossible to remove the bad paint job, Go for the yoghurt.

The post How to make yoghurt frosted glass appeared first on Green Prophet.

The Edmond and Lily Safra Center for Brain Sciences at The Hebrew University of Jerusalem is a pioneering research facility for the scientific exploration of the brain. The design incorporated passive energy applications but the photovoltaic skin advertised in the original drafts in 2013 were never implemented.

Physically, the building acts as a gateway between the university campus and city – its dynamic social spaces and laboratory facilities are designed to attract exceptional scientists, as well as to foster an interest in the centre’s research activities within the wider community.

The building is arranged as two parallel wings around a central courtyard. The upper levels house twenty-eight highly flexible laboratories linked by social hubs, which are conceived to encourage interaction and the exchange of ideas between students and staff. At ground floor, there are teaching facilities, a 200-seat auditorium, a library, café and a gallery for the display of brain art.

The courtyard at the heart of the scheme unites these different functions, establishes new circulation routes through the campus and draws the greenery of the surrounding landscape into the building. Planted with citrus trees and with a water feature along its length, the courtyard forms a quiet, reflective space and a cool microclimate, which can be further mediated by a retractable ETFE roof.

 

The centre’s progressive environmental strategy makes use of passive techniques to naturally reduce energy use. Local materials, such as Jerusalem stone, are utilised where possible, and the building is orientated east-west to reduce solar gain.

The upper three levels are shaded by a perforated aluminium screen, with a pattern derived from the neurological brain structure. Further passive cooling of the building is provided by translucent ETFE canopies to the west and east, which form distinctive markers for the main entrances.

The post Foster + Partners passive energy brain center in Jerusalem appeared first on Green Prophet.

Some advocates of eco architecture say that for preserving the urban space the higher up you build, the better. But with an astonishing amount of desert landscape all around us, in Asia, in the Middle East, Africa and even in the United States, we’re thinking – let’s showcase the buried homes, the sustainable buildings that have gone underground or which are built from caves. Underground homes which use earth as insulation can be heated and cooled passively and overhead, well just imagine the possibilities.

Stay with a Bedouin in his underground cave in Petra, Jordan

Although visitors don’t actually get a couch (they get a thin mat instead) and toilets don’t come with the package, just about everyone who has been to the cave in which Al-Bedoul was born and raised has good things to say: “Four friends and I spent one night at Ghassab’s cave. It was one of the most memorable experiences of my life. I wish we had been able to stay for longer. I would go back in a heart beat!”

700-year-old underground hobbit cave homes in Iran

Nothing we’ve encountered yet deserves the eco, efficient, friendly, green, sustainable award as much as these seven century old cave homes that are for rent or for sale in Iran. They look like they might have been conceived by Salvador Dali and built by Antoni Gaudí, but indeed these cave homes are much much older than that. Carved into the volcanic rock at the foot of Mt. Sahand in Northeast Iran, the homes comprise both under and above ground space. A novel idea for future off grid architects?

Stay cool in this  5 Star underground hotel in Turkey

We were quite taken with these long-standing caves in Iran, and with this eco-boutique hotel in Turkey, but neither match the style of the restored Yunak Evleri hotel in Cappadocia. With fixings such as marble in the reception area, it isn’t the most modest tourism facility we have featured, but we do love to see history, nature, and travel merge in creative harmony. Once a sextet of cave houses carved out of soft limestone, a little cleanup and modern conveniences were added to this 5th-6th century marvel to produce a 21st century luxury hotel.

Emergency underground desert dwelling

This desert home will save you from climate change. Built 3 stories underground these Underground Desert Living Units by Reynard Loki and Jennifer Daniels is more than conceptual. They are about survival: “You’ve seen it happening in Australia already: Desert is spreading and things just won’t grow,” says Lovelock. “The island nations like New Zealand will be spared that kind of damage.” 

Emre Arolat’s underground Sancaklar mosque in Turkey

We’ve featured some of the world’s most beautiful mosques on Green Prophet, but this is the first that resembles a cave. Slated for a prairie landscape in Buyuk Cekmece on the outskirts of Istanbul, the Sancaklar Mosque by Emre Arolat Architects is designed to offer genuine reprieve from the growing madness of urban life.

The post Stay in one of these underground caves or hotels appeared first on Green Prophet.

The intricate wood screens that protected windows throughout the Arab world are increasingly being reinvented – often at massive scale and using computer technology – to cover tall buildings as an oriental ornament, but also as a major element for sun-shading and passive cooling. Building owners report lowered maintenance costs too, as the screens minimize cleaning (and reduce water use).

The perforated aluminum skin of Qatar’s Doha Tower (aka The Burj Doha) in variegated depending on north, south, east and west exposures, in order to control day-lighting and provide bespoke interior shading.  The metal screen also reduces sand and grit build-up on underlying glass panels.

Saudi’s Breakwater Beacon is a honeycombed lighthouse that guides ships approaching the Red Sea port of Thuwal. This structure is loaded with imagery: it acts as an Arab wind chimney or “wind-catcher”, and the hexagonal precast concrete blocks are reminiscent of traditional mashrabiya screens and endangered native coral.

Louvre Abu Dhabi reinvents the classically vertical screen into a horizontal roof, which in turn – during daylight hours – casts a virtual mashrabiya pattern onto the museum’s walls.

Lusail District a mixed use development in Doha made harmonious in part by a common screen structure on the taller towers.

Windows projecting from the facade of residential buildings in Abu Dhabi’s Masdar Institute are protected by latticed concrete panels which control interior heat gain and minimize building maintenance.

Mucat’s Muttawar Lifestyle Community is a planned residential complex that incorporates classical elements of the Arabic courtyard house. Balconies, central gardens with water features, and mashrabiya screens sustainably maximize passive cooling.

The post Modern mashrabiya is Arab architecture made in the shade – check out these stunning photos appeared first on Green Prophet.

A new “green” teaching and research center in the Israeli-Arab town of Sakhnin showcases some of the best traditional approaches to construction in the hope that it will inspire modern building practices. And on a less concrete level, the building is seen as a “green bridge” between the Arab and Jewish communities. The Union of the Mediterranean recently awarded it first prize in a competition on energy conservation.

Architects anywhere can pick up on traditional Arab building techniques as a means to improve building efficiency, says Hussein Tarabeih (who we’ve filmed here), director of the Towns Association for Environmental Quality (TAEQ) for the six Arab-Israeli towns in the Beit Natufa Valley in the Lower Galilee. This is the association that commissioned the building.

“We have a lot of energy-saving elements built into the building,” Tarabeih says. “And it was important for us that we use the community. We conducted a survey asking them what they wanted and involved the older people quite a bit. The truth is that much of the knowledge on the traditional elements has been lost so we had to learn from the beginning. But this is one of the purposes for creating this building. We wanted to preserve the old traditional techniques.”

Traditional Arab building secrets

Tarabeih (pictured below) says many of the 20 features incorporated in the building could easily be applied to hot, desert climates anywhere, including California or Arizona, to keep edifices naturally cool in summer and warm in winter.

Constructed from adobe bricks made from mud and straw, the building in Sakhnin was designed by architect Abed Elrahman Yassin, a student of the late Egyptian “architect for the people” Hassan Fathy. Typical of Arabic homes throughout the Middle East, it has a wall and window covering called a mashrabiya. This feature, usually decorated with a geometrical design, serves as a sunshade and privacy screen.

Most traditional Arabic houses have a large patio, either on the exterior of the building or in a central courtyard. When paired with long, high windows and doors, and draft windows in the right orientation, the patios cool the circulating air and offer a pleasant seating area throughout the day. If a water fountain is placed in the center of an enclosed patio, the cooling effects are even greater.

Dome-shaped roofs are a traditional symbol of Arab architecture found in mosques throughout the world. On the practical side, they maintain cool air in the building. At the base of the dome, as in the Sakhnin structure, four small windows remove the hot air while channeling the cool air into the room.

Traditional skylights called tezana are made from glass spheres and tubes that allow natural sunlight to penetrate the rooms without the need of electric power in the daytime. When the glass is colored, the amount of direct sunlight into the rooms can be controlled.

Also central to traditional buildings, and seen today widely in countries like Iran, is the cooling wind tower. “Our water circulation tower, called a malkav in Arabic, is 12 meters high, and you can spray water in the top of the tower to cool down the air circulating through the building,” says Tarabeih.

The post How Traditional Arab Architecture is Greening Buildings in Israel appeared first on Green Prophet.

We’ve lauded the benefits of  ancient building techniques many times before. Both Hassan Fathy’s incredible mud structures in Egypt and ancient Syrian beehives are a model for sustainable design because neither require an air-conditioner to stay cool. But don’t worry. It isn’t necessary to live in a mud building or a cave in order to enjoy the benefits of passive design.

This 1700 square meter home designed by Senan Abdelqader is a contemporary stand out among the solid stone homes that typify architecture in the Arab village Beit Safafa located between Jerusalem and Bethlehem. It is wrapped in a mashrabiya – a latticed screen envelope on the outside of buildings that is not only aesthetically appealing, but also serves several practical functions.

The terraced home’s basement is tucked into the side of a steep slope. Natural lighting is facilitated with sunken courtyards that act as light wells. From this stout base emerges the rest of the home which is wrapped in a stone mashrabiya facade.

Stone is an excellent building material since it has superior thermal massing. In other words, it absorbs the heat of the day which can then be released at night when it is cooler. That being said, most of the stone being used in this region is Jerusalem stone – and its excess use exacts a steep environmental cost.

Set apart from the building, the pixelated envelope serves multiple functions: it circulates air to provide passive cooling, it deflects excess solar gain as well as wind and rain, and it allows just the right amount of diffused light to enter the home. This beautiful home also has a rooftop garden.

Beit Safafa is on the precipice of rapid urbanization. If that is the case and it has to be, we at least hope that other homes in the region will look to Abdelqader’s sustainable leadership for inspiration.

More Examples of Vernacular-Inspired Architecture:

Earth Architecture All the Way to Timbuktu

Hassan Fathy is the Middle East’s Father of Sustainable Architecture

The Epitome of Sustainable Architecture: 700 Year Old Iranian Caves

all images © Amit Giron

The post The Mashrabiya House Beats the Heat with Traditional Arabic Technique appeared first on Green Prophet.

The earliest known Mashrabiya dates to 12th century Baghdad, Iraq. A special architectural feature that provides passive cooling both in and outside of the building, it was particularly popular in Iraq during the 1920s and 1930s. Unfortunately, the Al Rasheed street Mashrabiyas influenced by the Art Deco and Art Nouveau movements during that time have since been destroyed. But Beirut-based 109 Architects has revived this ancient design technique with their own unique twist.

Mashrabiya refers to upper level balconies that are enclosed by a latticed woodwork (or other materials) that deflects the sun and permits natural air flow. There are two theories for the word’s etymology. Either it denotes “drinking or absorbing,” referring to the overhanging’s ability to absorb heat and humidity, or the word derives from the verb Ashrafa, which means to overlook.

The Université Saint-Joseph (USJ) campus currently in progress is wrapped in Moucharabieh-inspired perforations and a polycarbonate volume. (This is the word’s French spelling).

Not only do the perforations create an interesting play on light, but they also provide shading that keeps solar gain to a minimum during hot summers.

109 Architects paid special attention to the building’s particular urban context. Complete with comfortable meeting spaces and a landscaped terrace that overlooks Beirut, the building also features a random-opening treatment designed to give users a brief glimpse into destruction and violence that epitomized the Lebanese war.

:: Arch Daily

More on Architecture in the Middle East:

Omar Yousef Crowded Architecture

Hassan Fathy is the Middle East’s Father of Sustainable Architecture

Green Houses Open to the Public During Tel Aviv’s Annual Architecture Weekend

The post Mashrabiya: 12th Century Light & Cooling For Lebanon’s USJ Campus appeared first on Green Prophet.

After four years, the O-14 is finally complete, and is as righteous as it is “holey.”

Dubai has been eclipsed recently by a host of exciting developments in Abu Dhabi and Qatar, the first Middle Eastern country to host the World Cup. In part, this is because the splashy Emirate was forced to adopt a low profile following crippling economic collapse while other Gulf economies have rested comfortably on their oily laurels. Slowly slowly, however, debts are being paid and project development is inching forward. The O-14 Tower designed by Jesse Resiser and Nanoko Umemoto of RUR Architecture first broke ground in 2007 and is finally ready for occupancy. The doily appearance, albeit interesting to look at, does comprise beneficial environmental and structural elements, while simultaneously allowing for an unusual freedom on the inside.  

Lower level floors of the 22-storey multipurpose building will accommodate luxury shopping while the upper floors were designed as office space. The 300,000 square foot building will enjoy prime, high-end consumer traffic, located as it is on the Dubai Creek waterfront esplanade.

More than a funky facade, the concrete exterior serves as an exoskeleton that provides most of the building’s structural support. In other words, the skin and shell have been inverted. The shell also prevents excess solar heat gain, and the space between the outer framing and interior funnels heat upwards like a chimney.

Tenants will be pleased, since the passive cooling design will help to offset the high energy prices that are otherwise rampant in Dubai. In place of glass windows, the 1,000 holes also provide views for the building’s occupants, without letting in hot air.

:: Inhabitat

More Architecture news from the Middle East:

Checks and Balances: Keeping Greens Pearly Green From Design to Construction

Azouri Brothers & Shai Agassi Together Make Tel Aviv A Better Place

Moshe Safdie Goes To China

The post After Four Years, Dubai’s “Holey” O-14 Tower Finally Opens appeared first on Green Prophet.

The Hebrew language demonstrates the extent to which ancient Jews valued or, more accurately, revered nature for its life-giving properties. My favorite example of this sacred interconnectedness is the word for rain, which literally translates into “the coming down of water from clouds in the sky.” While this is fairly obvious, we don’t usually think of rain in those terms.

We think, “quick, where’s the umbrella?” or “drat, there goes my picnic lunch.” But the benefit of paying close, face-value attention to the mechanics of nature is that we can learn how to work within her parameters. This is something Israeli architects and designers have known for years, and consistently exploit in the most curvaceous, mind-bending ways. Mey and Boaz Kahn’s ecooler is no exception.

Based on two Middle Eastern concepts, of the clay jara and the mashrabiya, the ecooler is one of the friendliest examples of cooling I’ve ever seen, and so much more beautiful than the big lump of whirring metal we call the “air-conditioner.”

The clay Jara, an ancient jug, used to keep water cool by seepage and evaporation through the clay, according to the couple’s design explanation.

The mashrabiya, on the other hand, was a creative tool to separate indoor and outdoor spaces while still allowing for an infusion of air and light.

The Kahn’s combination of these two concepts culminates in water coursing through a cool network of hollow clay tiles joined together through designated connectors. Designed to connect to an almost infinite number of hand-crafted tiles, these cooling screens can fit any sized room.

And there is no need to banish the cooling-unit to the roof or spare bedroom since its aesthetic appeal is likely to make it any room’s feature. It requires no electricity, and incorporates all of the clever passive design nature intended us to use.

More creative artists and designers in Israel:

Fashion Contest Inspired by the Sea of Galilee

Are Kobi Levi’s Tongue Shoes Fit For Dancing?

EcoGir Flaunts Its Recycled Polyester Suits During New York Fashion Week

The post Mashrabiya “ecooler” Beats The Middle Eastern Heat appeared first on Green Prophet.