Title:
ANCIENT ARCHITECTURE FROM INDIA CAN BE AN EFFECTIVE WAY TO REDUCE THE RISING TEMPERATURE OF THE APARTMENT COMPLEXES IN GURGAON

Authors:
Zarah Kumar Sen

ABSTRACT:
The aim of the paper is to tackle climate change, the effects of which can be felt, with increasing magnitude, every passing month. Climate change affects everything on the planet including human beings. Humans have played an instrumental role in their own destruction by aiding the process of climate change, with careless use of our energy resources. With each passing year, Earth faces more and more irreversible damage. To combat this we must initiate and implement action. The focused goal of the paper is the application of ancient architectural designs as sustainable architecture in Gurgaon, a major satellite city and the second-largest IT hub in India. Urban cities are the biggest problem areas, with limited space, high population, and high energy consumption, therefore making them a mammoth problem. Sustainability is key to tackling climate change which is why the answer to the problem lies in sustainable architecture. Urban cities have an ever-growing need for housing and structures due to the increasing population. Gurgaon faces frequent heat waves, constantly high temperatures, and dust storms. The majority of the buildings rely solely on external cooling devices thereby increasing energy consumption. The paper reviews different passive cooling mechanisms and procedures that were implemented in ancient buildings and their efficiency while discussing the practicality in applying these mechanisms while building a modern structure. While the literature on the uses and application of ancient architecture to create sustainable, modern buildings is available, one of the prominent gaps is its implementation in urban areas like Gurgaon. This paper seeks to bridge together the scattered research put forth by all the literature to create a solution to the problem. The use of ventilation, as a cooling mechanism, was seen throughout every structure highlighting its effectiveness in creating cooler structures. Insulation was used as a way to stall the entry of heat into structures. Building material plays an imperative role in the overall thermal comfort of a structure. Evaporative cooling is one of the simplest and most effective cooling mechanisms ancient designs applied in structures. Excessive energy consumption and pollutants contribute to high temperatures. This paper discusses all these themes. The simplicity of ancient architecture made it incredibly sustainable. It incorporated passive cooling mechanisms for structures, ensuring thermal comfort and negating any polluting emissions. They had lower electricity/energy consumption, the use of which is directly related to the release of greenhouse gases which is one of the most potent causes of climate change. This paper is a thematic analysis of various researches done on the topic of ancient architecture, and a discussion based on the implementation of the said architecture in modern cities like Gurgaon. The objective of the paper is to present the feasibility of adapting ancient designs into modern structures, in order to create economical and green housing, with the application of passive cooling, by analyzing and identifying patterns in the available literature. It can be a way to curb the rising temperatures of this metropolitan city.