This research has the goal of determining, comparing and substantiating the actual outcomeof using sustainable practices, from a financial and environmental comfort point of view. The selectedcontext was of interest due to the challenge of quality sustainable construction at controlled costs,meant for inhabitants of the Portuguese cooperative housing, due to its economical implications andespecially its social ones. Two case studies of cooperative housing developments built in Portugal arepresented, the first with characteristics of traditional construction and the second including sustainablebuilding features. With these examples, it is intended to demonstrate that it is possible to build belowcost limits imposed by law in order to substantially reduce energy consumption costs for heating andcooling as well as for domestic water heating. So, calculations of energy savings in indoor heating andcooling, as well as for domestic water heating are presented in this article for two specific situations:first, for a standard comfort use of housing, as opposed to a situation of real consumption of housingdevelopments as obtained by monitoring carried out for one year in the same dwellings studied forstandard comfort. The causes that lead to a substantial decrease in energy consumption in the buildingof sustainable construction are also described, as a starting point to the improvement of futurecooperative housing. Finally are presented, for each of the two situations, calculations of the paybackperiod of investment, according to the specific incremental cost in sustainable construction and thebenefits in reducing consumptions. The results show an effective contribution to the improvement ofthe environment and environmental comfort, due to sustainable construction.
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