Environmental Design and Engineering MSc modules for the 2025/26 academic year

The module aims to provide you with essential knowledge and skills to select, assess, and develop optimal and cost-effective pathways to achieve net zero-carbon in the built environment. In the context of climate change, the module explores the fundamentals of energy, current and future energy and carbon emissions scenarios, and the environmental, social and economic problems associated with limited fossil fuel resources. Consequences for the design, engineering and regulatory processes of the built environment will be considered. You will gain a critical understanding of energy demand and carbon emissions in buildings and knowledge on electrification and decarbonisation of buildings by exploring principles of building physics, steady-state building simulation methods, economics of energy-efficiency measures, and roles of renewable technologies.

This module introduces a number of computational design support methods for sustainable buildings involving the use of building performance simulation tools and parametric modelling platforms. In design, having multiple conflicting objectives is the rule rather than the exception. This module will introduce you to new tools and methods to help tackle those design tensions. It will give you practical experience in using 3D parametric modelling and environmental simulation tools together with advanced optimisation techniques to explore design trade-offs. These techniques will be applied to a range of environmental design strategies, for example, to utilise and control solar radiation, enhance daylighting design of buildings and balance daylight provision, overheating and energy use.

This module introduces the notions of health and well-being within the context of the built environment, with a particular focus on buildings. It provides an overview of the main factors affecting health, well-being, human performance, and comfort in building design/operation. Basic principles of different aspects of Indoor Environmental Quality (IEQ), i.e., light, acoustics, temperature and air quality and their multi-modal effects on health and well-being. The module lays the foundations for key issues associated with health and well-being in the built environment and provides students with an opportunity to develop their learning further via a literature review, field measurements, and observation.

This module introduces the principles and practice of built environment laboratory and field experiment techniques using state-of-the-art facilities. Students will gain hands on experience in a series of experiments related to the monitoring and measurement of acoustics, air quality, and thermal and visual comfort. This module will link lab and field work to the energy and environmental performance of real buildings. It will also teach the necessary skills of data processing, analysis, and statistical methods required to interpret the results of experiments and inform building design and operation in practice.

This module equips students with essential tools to navigate the complex landscape of sustainable building design and resilience. It empowers students to evaluate the efficacy of passive design strategies in mitigating and adapting to the climate emergency. The module explores strategies including natural ventilation, mixed mode ventilation, passive solar heating and cooling, whilst addressing embodied carbon in domestic building design. It also confronts multifaceted challenges, such as the impact of vector-borne diseases on human habitats, using local and indigenous materials, cultural aspects, etc. This holistic approach encompasses passive building solutions and operational concerns and underscores the urgency of adapting our designs to confront the climate emergency and its interconnected challenges.

This module equips building designers with essential tools to understand, select, and design active building services systems to help achieve net zero greenhouse gas emissions in the context of a changing climate. It explores the steps in building design involved in the identification of active building elements/systems. Developing knowledge of the building systems, through lectures and tutorials, students will be introduced to the techniques used to select systems, and explore issues associated with the integration of these systems with the grid and on and off-site renewables. Energy flexibility and resilience will also be taught when considering system design. The fundamentals and applications of heating, ventilation, and air-conditioning (HVAC) systems and electrical lighting will be discussed in the context of sustainable building design and net-zero carbon buildings.