Abstract

The Government of Vietnam ratified the “United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change” on the 3rd
December 1998, indicating its commitment to environmentally sustainable development. Vietnam has also participated in
the “Asia Least-cost Greenhouse Gas Abatement Strategy” which promotes energy efficiency as a key priority. The
construction and manufacturing sectors in Vietnam are currently responsible for about 30% of total CO2 emission in the
country, and are therefore a target for CO2 reductions. As the result of an economic boom in Vietnam, there is a shortage
of commercial buildings in general and of office buildings in particular. This is most evident in Hanoi and Hochiminh City
which are enjoying substantial economic growth. Many new buildings are therefore being constructed in these cities, making
their level of sustainability of particular importance. Although there is a growing awareness among Vietnamese architects
of environmental issues and hence the recognition of the need for planning and development of low energy environmentally
friendly buildings, there is a lack of readily available information and design tools to enable the design community to achieve
this. It has been perceived that a simple and user-friendly calculation tool which can be used at the early stages of design
would be very useful to enable architects to formulate the most appropriate design strategies and solutions. This paper
describes the development of such a tool and sets out some results of its use. The aims of the paper are twofold: firstly it
summarises the results of parametric studies investigating the effect of design variables on the total energy performance of
office buildings in Vietnam using the computer simulation tool, TAS (Thermal Analysis System, a suite of software products
developed by Environmental Design Solutions Limited UK). Secondly, the paper documents the procedure used for the
development of the design tool that has been developed based on computer analysis and explains how it should be employed.
This design tool is capable of optimizing critical design decisions such as the distribution of glazing and the effect of
orientation on energy loads.