Generic Energy Efficiency Assessment for heritage buildings; Wekalat El-Ghouri as a case study, Cairo, Egypt.

Passively designed buildings are the tradition of historic areas of metropolitan Cairo. According to UNESCO, Cairo was inscribed on the World Heritage in 1979 under the title of “Islamic Cairo”, recognizing its unquestionable historical, archaeological and urbanistic importance. Among Islamic Cairo Heritage buildings, Wekalet El-Ghouri is located in Al-Azhar area, was built in 1504 by the Memluk Sultan Qunsuwah El Ghouri. This research paper aims to investigate such historical passive design of Wekalet El-Ghouri in terms of energy efficiency simulations using eQuest, whereas sustainability assessment used a developed generic rating criterion for existing buildings. The 40 cm brick walls Wekala building was examined in comparison to its images; 12 cm, and 25 cm envelopes and simulated to compare its green rating calculated by the generic optimized rating criterion. The original passive case of the building showed the highest earned credit points by the generic criterion.