Investigating the planning process and the environmental regulatory framework in order to promote renewable energy in Algerian cities.

Abstract

Under the domination of powerful national actors , cities cross Algeria still struggle to position themselves in the design of policy alternatives to achieve energy transition. The aim of this study was: to ascertain the gaps that blocks the transmission of national planning policies to city scale, to examine the regulatory framework that refers to environment interfering with the built environment and to present samples of qualitative and quantitative tools that can be used by city experts to promote the solar energy in cities without scarifying the architectural quality of the built environment. The adopted research design is qualitative. A global approach analysis of the different urban planning and environment protection instrument was presented. To cover all the aspects of the regulatory framework, a content analysis of the texts related to the building sector on one hand and those treating renewable energy and energy efficiency preoccupations on the other hand was done. From the analysis it was highlighted that there is a conflict of scale between the national and the local scale. The national instruction seems too ambiguous to be translated on city scale. In addition, the texts relating to energy are restricted to a set of methods of calculation and standards that can be applied only at a late stage of the design. Finally, the thesis proposes a specific local instrument dealing with architectural details. Treating the synergy of energy efficiency and renewable energy preoccupations and architectural quality constraints. It intervenes the planning processes and support decision making regarding the use of solar technologies