Building Performance Analysis

4Fundamentals of Building Performance

The first three chapters of the book have provided a foundation for working with the concept of building performance. Chapter 1 defined building performance as related to either a building as an object or to building as construction process. It points to three main views of the concept: an engineering, a process and an aesthetic perspective. Chapter 2 positioned building performance in wider context, reviewing the building life cycle, stakeholders, systems and challenges that drive the interest in performance. Chapter 3 explored the stakeholder needs and requirements that underlie the interest in building performance and the different functions that buildings perform. Building on these foundations, this chapter focusses on the key area of building performance itself and explores the quantification of building performance, the experiments and metrics used, and building performance measures as well as signs of performance problems.

Even with this extensive background, building performance remains a complex concept. Various authors have tried to dissect building performance into core elements and their interrelations, with key contributions being the work of Report 64 by CIB W60, Vanier et al. (1996), Foliente et al. (1998) and Augenbroe (2011). This has led to a general view with increasingly fine detail, although these sources often use slightly different terminology. An overview and mapping of terms is provided in Figure 4.1.

Figure 4.1 ...