Integrating principles of passive cooling in the design of five star hotel, Minna

The world faces the problem of energy crisis. Nigeria, not being an exception faces the same problem as its generating capacity is below 5000 megawatts. Studies have also shown that only 48% of Nigerians have access to electricity, ranking Nigeria among the lowest in the world.Generally, buildings uses approximately 40% of the total energy consumed globally and represent 33% of the annual carbon dioxide emission that causes global warming. Hotel buildings use60% out of the 40% of the energy consumed by buildings. Considering that hotel buildings represent a large proportion of a county‟s energy consumption.This suggeststhe need for urgent and concerted action by all stakeholders in the construction industry to minimise ecological degradation on a massive scale. The research approach is quantitative in nature and adopts both primary and secondary sources of data collection. The research instruments utilized during the course of the study include; Self-administered questionnaireand Non-participant observation.Literature review utilizes the review of works done on the subject drawn from publishedbooks, articles, journals, papers and official documents of professional bodies and anenergy audit was used to studythe energy use patterns, principles of passive cooling and the architectural requirement of three selected hotelbuildingswithin the composite of hot-humid/hot-dry climate of Nigeria.The research has disaggregated energy demand in hotel buildings into cooling, lighting and other appliances with cooling accounting for 57% followed by appliances with 30% and lighting 13%. The research has also establishedthat energy consumption in hotel buildings within a composite of hot-humid/hot-dry climate of Nigeria is 157kWh/m². Computer simulation has further revealed that the average normalized cooling load for conventional material/construction is 126kWh/m² while that of optimized material/construction is 88kWh/m². Finally, the research recommendsthatcooling end-use in hotel designbe targeted by integrating principles of passive cooling as this will provide a substantial savingsin energy consumption of up to45%.