Proposed for achieving mandatory energy credit 2: Minimum Energy Performance in an Egyptian Green Building Rating System

People spend most of their life in buildings, be it homes, work places, education facilities or entertainment centers. Buildings as such represent a large economical investment and have significant impacts on our lives and performance. As buildings is one of the most energy consuming sectors on earth, so if energy efficient buildings could be built and supplied with sustainable energy sources, it would be a real positive contribution towards confronting this challenge in a sustainable way. Hence, energy is one of the major categories that almost all the Green Building Rating Systems all over the world are developed to measure and conserve. This paper introduces a scientific guideline towards developing and enhancing the Energy Category of the Egyptian Green Building Rating System. Thus, this research aims at promoting minimum energy consumption for green construction in Egypt and also represents a brief summary of the code contents specially, the effectiveness of building envelope, Lighting and Mechanical equipment such as HVAC systems in reducing electrical energy consumption. Finally, this research introduces a framework for green buildings design to support planners in choosing optimum customized building envelope designs (walls, windows...etc.) over the building lifetime.