ASSESS THE ECO-FRIENDLY BUILDING DESIGN FEATURES IN THE HIGH RISE OFFICE BUILDINGS IN ADDIS ABABA

Abstract

Building design and construction technologies are having several new and emerged paradigms for the enhancement of eco-friendliness. In Addis Ababa, the existing models in the current state of the art have salient issues and challenges that can affect human wellbeing and the environment adversely. Now the day office towers dominate the skylines of the city; Instead of taking advantage of the ideal climatic conditions of the city, most buildings in the city use glass facades causing glares and increasing energy consumption. Lack of greeneries leads to the creation of urban heat islands. Therefore, the application of eco-friendliness in a high-rise office building can moderate these impacts. The eco-friendly high-rise office building can improve the comfort of the occupants, provide occupants with a good working environment, are conducive to the physical and mental health of the occupants, and improve the occupants’ quality of life and work efficiency by protecting the natural environment from damage. On the other hand, Ethiopia is a developing country where the transformation towards sustainability of the building features is still not been fully explored in the building construction industry. In this context, an investigation and analysis are required to be done for checking that the current situation of the high-rise office buildings in Addis Ababa regarding eco-friendliness, and the framework and strategy which can be adapted as per the localized context of the building facilities for one step toward sustainability in built-environment of the city. The objective of this research is to assess the current scenario of eco-friendliness in the conventional high-rise office buildings to understand the gap, and strategies to contribute to the enhancement of the transformation of the building practice to eco-friendly building practice. A checklist is prepared based on the features of eco-design for building and local context and the selected buildings are checked to be resilient to the eco-friendly building. This research found that the case buildings has don’t satisfy the features of eco-friendliness. It gives a direction for future buildings to be built to incorporate eco-friendly building features. After analyzing the findings, a design and implementation framework, and design proposal with recommendations on the studied parameters are provided.