A Cross Scale Analysis of the Relationship between Energy Efficiency and Urban Morphology in the Greek City Context

Urban form is a decisive factor for the energy efficiency of the city. The compact city has been suggested as the most sustainable urban form, but it has been questioned as well by many researchers. Urban morphology is not a simple aggregation of geometry factors, but also the interaction among a set of parameters, that include constructional, functional and building regulation constraints concerning a range of different scales as well. This paper examines in which way the interaction of such parameters affects the energy efficiency of the urban tissue focusing in the Greek city context. A set of building block typologies are analyzed with regard to their geometry factors such as S/V ratios, plot ratio and building ratio. Thermal loads are calculated in order to draw conclusions about the relation between geometry factors and energy efficiency. The results of the research indicate that there is a strong relationship between urban morphology factors and energy efficiency. The theory of compactness of the urban form is generally confirmed by the results of the study which are valuable, since they indicate the energy profile of each typology and can be used for predicting the performance of potential energy demand of urban blocks with similar geometry.