Abstract

Energy consumption in hot–arid and warm climates is driven by cooling demand during long, intense summers. In these contexts, the residential sector accounts for much of national electricity use, and cooling can exceed 70% of annual household consumption. Saudi Arabia exemplifies this pattern, with the residential sector consuming over half of the national electricity and cooling dominating demand in hot–arid cities like Riyadh. Against this background, this study explores the adaptation of the Passive House approach—originally developed in cold and temperate regions—for a cooling-dominated, hot–arid context. A detached villa in Riyadh was selected as a case study, and its energy performance was modeled in DesignBuilder using a baseline calibrated against 12 months of electricity bills. Passive House measures were then tested. The results showed that insulating walls and roofs provided the largest reductions in electricity use, at 21% and 15%, respectively, while high-performance glazing with external shading achieved an additional 3.4%. Improvements in airtightness and ventilation with heat recovery yielded only minor savings in a cooling-dominated climate. When all measures were implemented together, the villa’s annual electricity consumption was reduced by 48% compared with the baseline, and cooling demand was reduced by 72.3%. These findings demonstrate that Passive House measures can be effectively adapted to hot–arid conditions, with envelope insulation and solar-gain control delivering the most significant benefits. The Riyadh case underscores the potential of Passive House principles to reduce residential electricity use in cooling-dominated housing and to support energy-efficient design in hot–arid and warm-climate regions.

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