Critique of Paper: "Evaluation of traditional architecture in terms of building physics: Old Diyarbakír houses" by

Müjgan Şerefhanoğlu Sözena and Gülay Zorer Gedík

MSc Architecture: Advanced Environmental and Energy Studies

Craig Embleton, 0750553, Group 1 (Melissa Taylor), A2 (Climate, Comfort

and Building Performance) Critique of Paper

“EVALUATION OF TRADITIONAL ARCHITECTURE IN TERMS

OF BUILDING PHYSICS: OLD DIYARBAKÍR HOUSES”
By Müjgan Şerefhanoğlu Sözena and Gülay Zorer Gedík

Word Count 2718

admin@greenfrontier.org
http://www.greenfrontier.org

For the attention of Melissa Taylor

November 23rd 2009

Craig Embleton, 0750553, Group 1 (Melissa Taylor), B1 Essay admin@greenfrontier.org Page 1 of 18

 Table of Contents

TABLE OF CONTENTS.............................................................................................. 2

FACTUAL SUMMARY................................................................................................ 3

CONTEXTUALISATION............................................................................................. 5

CRITIQUE................................................................................................................... 6

CONCLUSION.......................................................................................................... 12

BIBLIOGRAPHY...................................................................................................... 14

APPENDICES........................................................................................................... 16
Factual summary

Problem addressed.
The authors’ aim was to evaluate the traditional architecture, including layouts, plan

and envelope, of the houses in old Diyarbakír, in southeastern Turkey, in terms of

building physics. They aimed to study heat-humidity, solar radiation, and natural

ventilation of the houses as major areas, with natural lighting and acoustics

examined to a lesser extent.

A serious concern of the authors’ was that the homogenisation of global architectural

in the era of cheap fossil fuels has lead to inappropriate buildings being constructed

in Diyarbakír, as everywhere else, that rely on inputs from HVAC1 systems. They

wished to emphasise those features of the buildings in old Diyarbakír that work with

the specific local environment rather than against it, and to use this information to

design energy efficient dwellings.

Data
In section 2.1 the authors present grouped, collected climatic data for Diyarbakír.

Afterwards the data, or information, in this paper is a series of observations and

descriptions of the settlement and buildings. This begins in section 2.2, with a

description of the orientation and layout of the dwellings, including their relationship

to one another. The authors explain the room types in the individual houses and their

seasonal usage.

The bulk of this paper comprises section 3: Evaluation of the old settlement in terms

of building physics. A series of fourteen bullet-point descriptions expand upon

information given in section 2.2, that the authors’ propose cover how the buildings

meet the various building physics elements. The last two descriptions are reserved

for acoustics. The previous twelve are not split up into individual elements of building

physics, however all the elements are touched upon.

1
Heating, Ventilating, and Air Conditioning
Arguments
The authors’ argue that the traditional houses are better suited to the environment of

old Diyarbakír than modern houses, because the designers had to be more aware of

the local climate because HVAC systems were not available. They do not, however,

advocate a return to building in the vernacular, but suggest that modern architects

should draw upon the techniques used of old and incorporate them with new

technologies in order to build energy efficient houses suited to the locality. This

includes taking into account solar orientation, the use of open and semi-open rooms,

central courtyards and water. The authors provide a good description of how the

houses in old Diyarbakír function in relation to elements of building physics but

present no empirical data, such as internal temperature, taken from the settlement,

or nearby modern houses to assist their argument.

Contextualisation

The learning outcomes of the module included a desire to impart ‘a knowledge of

climate, human and building interactions’ that can be related to building design

(Randall, D 2009). This relates strongly to the aims of the study, which emphasised

the importance of designing buildings appropriate to the locality for thermal comfort

and energy efficiency. Although theories of thermal comfort were absent.

The lectures Climate, and Thermal Mass in buildings provided background

information that set the context of this study. While the study assisted the

understanding of the lectures Climate Influences on the Design of Buildings and

Climate Influences: Built Examples.

There are many related papers to be found in the scientific literature. Few take

similar approaches to this one offering descriptive arguments, while most take more

mathematical approaches to measuring building physics.

Critique
Structure
This paper is one of several the authors have written about old Diyarbakír and takes

a descriptive rather than empirical approach, assuming the readers accept the

importance of appropriate design. Accepting this, the paper can be read as a

standalone piece.

The paper is reasonably well structured.

The abstract and the introduction lay out the problem to be addressed and the intent

of the paper clearly. There is some confusion in the abstract, but that is not a

structural issue and will be discussed later. Climatic data is clearly presented in

section 2.1, although a little sparse. Section 2.2 gives good, clear background

information about the architecture of old Diyarbakír.

However the content provided in section 3, the bulk of the paper, is not well

structured. The abstract states that the architectural properties of the Diyarbakír

houses will be investigated in terms of building physics criteria. It lists these

properties as: layouts, plan types, building envelope and façade.

The introduction provides the building physics criteria as: heat, humidity (sometimes

as heat-humidity), air movements, light and sound. This leads one to expect later

sections in the paper to contain sub-sections that match either the architectural

properties listed or the building physics criteria. Although section 3 is titled

“Evaluation of the old settlement in terms of building physics”, it contains no sub-

sections based on either of lists provided earlier, although it does explicitly state that

the last two bullet points in are for investigation of acoustics, further highlighting the

absence of the other criteria.

The conclusion that follows is well structured and persuasive meeting the aims set

out in the abstract.

Data used.
Section 2.1 presents limited climatic data, for Diyarbakír. But it is highly grouped and

some important information is absent. For example the authors state ‘The large

variations between night–day and summer–winter temperatures make adaptation to

the climate difficult’ yet they fail to present any data to substantiate diurnal variation.

The temperature of mean summer and winter months is given showing a variation of

26.8°C (30.5 °C - 3.7 °C), however there is no actual confirmation as which months

these periods refer to or how the data was collected. A reference is given to a paper

published by the same authors in 1996 indicating that the data is quite old. This is

particularly important in light of climate change. More up-to-date climatic data should

have been used.

Table 1. Mean summer and winter temperature data presented in paper compared to
NASA annual averaged values for a 22-year period (January 1983 – December
2004)
Temperature (°C) Air Earth
Şerefhanoğlu Sözen temperature temperature
and Gedík (°C) NASA (°C) NASA
Mean spring (March – 13.9 16.4
May)
Mean summer months 30.5 28.6 34.3
(June – August)
Mean autumn 17.5 19.4
(September –
November)
Mean winter (December 3.7 3.2 3.6
– February)
Mean temperature 26.8 25.4 30.7
difference between
summer and winter
months
Şerefhanoğlu Sözen, M. et al (2007), NASA, (2009). See Appendix 1 for NASA
source data.
The authors make an error in the units they use for precipitation: mm/m2. The units

should have simply been mm.

It would have been helpful if the authors had described Diyarbakír’s climate using the

Köppen climate classification system so readers could place it in context with other

areas – see appendices 2 and 3.

The rest of the paper is conspicuously lacking in empirical data. However the word

data can simply mean information (CED2, 2003). Using this definition most data is

presented in section 3 “Evaluation of the old settlement in terms of building physics”.

It is a descriptive narrative that uses adjectives rather than numbers.

Describing orientation to utilise or reduce solar gain the authors state:

“The majority of the houses, blocks are placed on the north and south part of the

court.”

“[Blocks] orientated to the north is much more than in the other direction.”

“Generally […] rooms for summer use are paced on the south part…”

This is not an evaluation; it is a summary. The authors could have used percentages

of total to make their case. Writing about temperature the authors state:

“The summer rooms have high ceilings […]. In these rooms mean radiant

temperature is low…” They could cite temperatures in the summer rooms and

compare them to the winter rooms. The section continues in the same manner.

Discussing the building envelope the authors do cite the coefficient of heat

transmission of basalt stone and the thickness of the outer walls (0.5 – 0.8 metres)

as evidence that this mass prolongs heat transfer from outside to inside, but again

there is no attempt to quantify it with measurements taken within and without the

wall.

Ventilation as air movement is mentioned twice in the section, described as efficient

in summer rooms and very limited in winter rooms. Natural light has four brief

mentions. Neither ventilation nor lighting is quantified. Despite the authors’ stated

2
Collins English Dictionary
aim that natural ventilation would be a major area of study, with acoustics examined

to a lesser extent, the later element was examined in its own specific subsection.

Overall the data is lacking and the authors do not describe how it is arrived at.

The sample size is unknown. Even if the readers assume it is the whole of the old

city of Diyarbakír, they still don’t know the actual number of houses.

The authors describe the features of the houses and settlement well, which supports

the importance of traditional design for energy efficiency. But their case is badly let

down by a lack of actual figures (e.g temperature) and a comparison with a modern

building.

Arguments used.
This paper starts with a confusing abstract:

“Today, in spite of new technological advances, techniques and materials, identical

buildings are still being built, and climatic design is not considered important in

Diyarbakír.”

The phrase ‘identical buildings are still being built,’ can be interpreted that new

buildings in Diyarbakír follow the vernacular design. However, the rest of the abstract

contradicts this viewpoint. The reader must assume that the authors’ intention was to

say that homogenous (identical) buildings are constructed throughout the world

regardless of climate. It becomes obvious reading the paper that this was the

intention.

Thus the general argument put forward by the authors is that features in traditional

buildings that are absent from modern buildings are important in designing energy

efficient, environmentally appropriate buildings. This is a persuasive argument and

could lead the reader to conclude that a return to building in the vernacular would be

best for designing energy efficient buildings.

Throughout section 2.2 and 3 of the paper the authors describe the architecture of

both the settlement of Diyarbakír and the houses found therein well and put forth a
good case that the ancient architects worked logically and in harmony with their local

environment. The authors’ assume readers have a prior knowledge of environmental

architecture can accept that the features they describe, such as solar orientation of

houses, and the use of water for cooling, will indeed help maintain a pleasant

environment for human habitation. However the authors fail to present any figures,

either measured by instruments or elicited from inhabitants, to back up their

statements.

In the penultimate paragraph of the conclusion the authors mention a previous paper

written by Gedik, GZ in which s/he compared the summer room of an old Diyarbakír

dwelling with a room in a modern one using the cooling load calculation method

ASHRAE3 developed. This previous study concludes that ‘by designing the building

envelope with insulation according to the thermal insulation regulations of Turkey

more energy efficient buildings than the old ones could be attained’ (2004). The

authors reproduced in this statement in the conclusion of this paper. Then in the final

sentence of the conclusion they verify that they are not proposing a return to the

vernacular, but aim to draw upon it and incorporate new technologies to improve it.

This was not clear from the abstract or the introduction.

Gedik’s earlier paper did contain the results of empirical evidence to support her/his

claims, and other similar studies also collected measurements. A study into

architecture in a hot dry climate was performed by Al-Hemiddi, N.A. et al, who

investigated the effect of a ventilated interior courtyard on the thermal performance

of a house in Al-Oyyena village, near Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. They recorded data

throughout the summer of 1997, and concluded that the courtyard efficiently

provided cool air indoors through cross-ventilation Their study produced a model that

estimated the indoor daily average dry-bulb temperature as a function of outdoor

temperature and wind speed (2001).

3
American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air-conditioning Engineers
Hens, H.S.L.C. describes building physics as ‘an applied science that studies the

hygrothermal4, acoustical and light-related properties of building components, rooms,

buildings and building assemblies’ with importance placed on user health and

comfort (2007). The authors of this paper discussed the elements of building

physics, but did not relate them to theories of user thermal comfort. They mention

that the building envelope is an efficient element for thermal comfort and cite the

thickness and coefficient of heat transmission of basalt walls, but fail to offer indoor

and outdoor temperatures. In the conclusion they argue that modern buildings cause

thermal discomfort but fail to discuss human thermal comfort such as the work of

Olgay and Fanger.

In comparison, Manioğlu, G et al conducted a study to compare thermal conditions of

a traditional and a modern residential building in Mardin, also in southeast Turkey,

and in a concurrent study canvassed the residents of 68 traditional and 32 modern

buildings with questionnaires to determine their opinion of the indoor environment in

a number of their houses’ indoor and outdoor rooms. Users perceived that under hot

summer conditions, traditional houses provide cooler environments than modern

houses. The authors of this paper don’t canvass residents.

Overall the lack of evidence hampers the authors’ case and only through researching

other books and papers can a reader concur with the authors’ view that the

vernacular has features to assist the modern architect in designing energy efficient

buildings.

The authors’ do not attempt to balance their argument. It is stated in the abstract that

‘the aim of the study is to emphasize the importance of the features of traditional

buildings…’, not to compare the vernacular with the modern and draw conclusions

from results and/or opinions gathered.

4
Heat and moisture.
Conclusion
Overall judgement of the case made
Overall the authors produce a logical case that the buildings of old Diyarbakír were

designed to work with the local environment rather than against it. However this

paper proposed to evaluate the building physics of these buildings, but contained

only descriptive narrative and no hard evidence-based data or calculations. This

damaged the case. Not every element of building physics was covered in depth.

Their aim ‘to emphasise the importance of the features of traditional buildings in

terms of designing energy efficient […] appropriate buildings…’ was also weakened

by lack of evidence, particularly a lack of comparison to modern local buildings.

The authors draw strong conclusions about the benefits of vernacular architecture,

over modern homogenised global architecture, but assume that the readers already

agree with their standpoint and require no supporting data.

Implications for discussions in the field

This paper added some useful background information to discussions in the field, by

providing a good descriptive case study. It expanded upon the material in the module

lecture Climate Influences on Design: Built Examples, by examining one particular

settlement in depth. In turn, the module lecture Climate Influence on the Design of

Buildings, provided excellent background material to this paper, discussing topics

such as thermal mass, diurnal temperature changes, proportion and depth of

houses, shading and site orientation.

Most of the paper promotes the current academic orthodoxy that traditional houses

are more energy efficient than standard modern houses because, by necessity, they

include design features attuned to their local microclimate. However, the paper

concludes that well designed modern houses could be even more energy efficient

than the vernacular by combining traditional features with new materials and

techniques. However the authors do not state the nature of these new materials.
Further research required
Further research would be to capture data to validate the authors’ case with

reference to the individual elements of building physics that they discuss.

Experiments should be designed to measure these variables within individual

traditional and modern buildings.

Although most traditional houses are placed on the south parts of the block and

oriented north, other houses are oriented in other directions. Also, although most

rooms for summer use are orientated north, and winter use orientated south, not all

are. There are various other discrepancies in the optimal architectural arrangement

of the houses. Temperature, solar radiation, relative humidity, lighting levels and

noise levels should be measured in the various indoor and outdoor rooms of many

individual traditional houses and logged throughout a year. A large sample size of

houses should be taken and comparisons made between those oriented and used

optimally in terms of environmental design and those orientated sub optimally.

Also, similar measurements should be taken of modern houses constructed in the

vicinity, with the inhabitants of these houses avoiding the use of HVAC over the

period of the study. There should be two categories of modern house: those built

prior to and those built after the thermal insulation requirements of Turkey came into

force. Both types should be evaluated and compared to the various traditional

houses. Also full lifecycle analysis evaluations should be conducted for traditional

and modern houses

Alongside the data logging that is taking place the inhabitants of the houses should

be regularly surveyed for their perception of thermal satisfaction with the

environment they live in.

Bibliography
Al-Hemiddi, N.A. and Megren Al-Saud, K.A. (2001). The effect of a ventilated

interior courtyard on the thermal performance of a house in a hot–arid region.

Renewable Energy, 24(3-4):581-595.

Collins English Dictionary (2003). 6th ed. Glasgow: HarperCollins. P425

G.Z. Gedik. (2004). Climatic design: an analysis of the old houses of Diyarbakır

in the southeast region of Turkey. Architectural Science Review. 47 (2004), 1–10.

Hens, H.S.L.C. (2007). Building Physics - Heat, Air and Moisture: Fundamentals

and Engineering. Berlin: Ernst & Sohn. p1-2.

Manioğlu, G. and Yılmaz, Z. (2008). Energy efficient design strategies in the hot

dry area of turkey. Building and Environment, 43(7):1301-1309.

McMullan, R (2002). Environmental Science in Building. 5th ed. Basingstoke:

Palgrave Macmillan. p39.

NASA. (2009). NASA Surface meteorology and Solar Energy - Definitions.

Available: http://eosweb.larc.nasa.gov/sse/text/definitions.html. Last accessed 17

November 2009.

NASA. (2009). NASA Surface meteorology and Solar Energy: RETScreen Data.

Available: http://eosweb.larc.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/sse/retscreen.cgi?email=rets
%40nrcan.gc.ca&step=1&lat=37+55&lon=40+12&submit=Submit. Last accessed 17

November 2009

Oak Ridge National Laboratory Distributed Active Archive Center. (2007). Data Set:

World map of the Koppen-Geiger climate classification. Available:

http://webmap.ornl.gov/kmz/ornldaac_ds10012.kmz. Last accessed 12 November

2009.

Peel, MC, Finlayson, BL and McMahon, TA. (2007). Updated world map of the

Köppen-Geiger climate classification. Available: http://www.hydrol-earth-syst-

sci.net/11/1633/2007/hess-11-1633-2007.pdf. Last accessed 12 November 2009.

Randall, D (2009). Introduction and Welcome to A2. Machynlleth: Centre of

Alternative Technology.

Şerefhanoğlu Sözen, M. and Gedík, G.Z. (2007). Evaluation of traditional

architecture in terms of building physics: Old diyarbakír houses. Building and

Environment, 42(4):1810-1816.

Word Count – 2718

Appendices
Appendix 1. Climatic data for Diyarbakír

Month Air Relative Daily solar Atmospheric Wind Earth

temperature humidity radiation – pressure (kPa) speed temperature
(°C) (%) horizontal (m/s) (°C)
(kWh/m2/d)

January 2.3 75.1% 2.24 92.4 3.1 2.6

February 3.2 71.1% 3.04 92.2 3.2 4

March 7.7 61.0% 4.24 92 3.2 9.2

April 14 51.5% 5.35 91.9 3.2 16.3

May 20 41.2% 6.56 91.8 3.2 23.6

June 25.8 30.4% 7.57 91.4 3.5 31.2

July 30.5 23.1% 7.46 91.2 3.7 36.9

August 29.6 25.0% 6.7 91.3 3.7 34.9

Septembe 24.7 29.2% 5.59 91.8 3.6 28.1

r

October 17.9 42.7% 3.73 92.2 3.3 19.7

November 9.8 59.7% 2.69 92.5 3.1 10.5

December 4 73.8% 2.01 92.5 3.1 4.3

Annual 15.8 48.7% 4.76 91.9 3.3 18.5

Measured 10 0
at (m)
Source: NASA, (2009).
Appendix 2. Description of Köppen climate symbols and defining criteria
showing Diyarbakír as Csa.
1s 2nd 3r Description Criteria*
t d
A Tropical Tcold≥18
f - Rainforest Pdry≥60
m - Monsoon Not (Af) & Pdry≥100–MAP/25
w - Savannah Not (Af) & Pdry<100–MAP/25
B Arid MAP<10×Pthreshold
W - Desert MAP<5×Pthreshold
S - Steppe MAP≥5×Pthreshold
h - Hot MAT≥18
k - Cold MAT<18
C Temperate Thot>10 & 0<Tcold<18
s - Dry Summer Psdry<40 & Psdry<Pwwet/3
w - Dry Winter Pwdry<Pswet/10
f - Without dry season Not (Cs) or (Cw)
a - Hot Summer Thot≥22
b - Warm Summer Not (a) & Tmon10≥4
c - Cold Summer Not (a or b) & 1≤Tmon10<4
D Cold Thot>10 & Tcold≤0
s - Dry Summer Psdry<40 & Psdry<Pwwet/3
w - Dry Winter Pwdry<Pswet/10
f - Without dry season Not (Ds) or (Dw)
a - Hot Summer Thot≥22
b - Warm Summer Not (a) & Tmon10≥4
c - Cold Summer Not (a, b or d)
d - Very Cold Winter Not (a or b) & Tcold<–38
E Polar Thot<10
T - Tundra Thot>0
F - Frost Thot≤0
Source: Hydrology and Earth System Sciences (2007).
*MAP = mean annual precipitation, MAT = mean annual temperature, Thot =
temperature of the hottest month, Tcold = temperature of the coldest month, Tmon10 =
number of months where the temperature is above 10, Pdry = precipitation of the
driest month, Psdry = precipitation of the driest month in summer, Pwdry = precipitation
of the driest month in winter, Pswet = precipitation of the wettest month in summer,
Pwwet = precipitation of the wettest month in winter, Pthreshold = varies according to the
following rules (if 70% of MAP occurs in winter then Pthreshold = 2 x MAT, if 70% of
MAP occurs in summer then Pthreshold = 2 x MAT + 28, otherwise Pthreshold = 2 x MAT +
14). Summer (winter) is defined as the warmer (cooler) six month period of ONDJFM
and AMJJAS.
Source: Peel, MC et al. (2007).
Appendix 3. Köppen climate map showing Diyarbakír in relation to
Turkey and surrounding countries.

Source: Oak Ridge National Laboratory (2007), Google Earth (2009).