A New MINDSET: Regenerative Design to Counter Climate Changes for Reaching Net-Positive Energy Buildings in Egypt

Abstract

Climate change is the most critical global challenge countering today; therefore, the impacts of climate change require an urgent and collective response where building and construction industry is regarded as one of the highest contributors to many issues that the world is encountering today, especially in a country undergoing rapid urbanization and industrialization such as Egypt. The primary objective of this paper is to promote the use of regenerative design to develop buildings intended to restore and improve the surrounding natural environment by aiming to leave a positive impact instead of harm reduction and participation in Egypt's plan for encountering climate change through a theoretical study for regenerative design and the Living Building Challenge (LBC) as a supporting tool to simplify the regenerative approach for discussing Net-Positive Energy Buildings, where the buildings aim not simply to generate energy but to identify the purpose and the way to handle resources to provide more than the building requires. Then the paper summarized two office buildings that achieved the Living Building Challenge certification, which provides using different architectural and mechanical systems working in concert to perform better, and this could be a reference repeated in developing countries such as Egypt. The study found that regenerative buildings offer an exceptional opportunity to effectively solve current environmental problems and achieve Net-Positive impacts on buildings to “add value” and be designed and operated to generate more than is needed.

Keywords

• keywords- climate change
• regenerative design
• living building challenge (lbc)
• net-positive energy buildings (npebs)