A Comprehensive Framework to Enhance Existing Housing Design and Sustainability

This PhD project aims to develop a comprehensive framework to enhance the energy performance and overall livability of the existing housing stock. The primary objective is to initiate transdisciplinary research through close collaboration between architects and engineers to develop a cost-effective and practical framework alongside comprehensive transitional strategies toward sustainable housing. The project focuses on SEQ, where residential sites occupy around 80% of its suburban built environment. It explores modern technologies, sustainable materials and innovative design to retrofit existing residential properties and will investigate spatial and socio-economic values associated with these interventions for the household, city councils, energy system operators and beyond. As such, the goals of the project encompass the development of a cost-effective and practical framework containing energy consumption calculations, policy recommendations, comprehensive reports and design guidelines, to be generative of architecturally designed pleasant indoor and outdoor spaces, while being highly effective in terms of their contribution to reducing energy use, thereby facilitating steps towards Australia’s ambition of net zero by 2050.