9. High-Rise Buildings in Context of Sustainability; Urban Metaphors of Greater Cairo, Egypt: A Case Study on Sustainability and Strategic Environmental Assessment

The goal of this chapter is to showcase high-rise buildings in Cairo and assess their level of sustainability. This chapter describes and argues how high-rise buildings can contribute to increase the efficiency of the sustainable built environment with the intent to cut carbon dioxide (CO₂) emissions. It lays an emphasis on high-rise buildings in Cairo and Giza cities as case studies and presents an impartial assessment and evaluation of the most cutting-edge tall buildings. The first section of the chapter discusses the historical outlook of the world’s oldest high-rise building—the Giza pyramids. In terms of sustainability principles, high-rise buildings are widely considered a good approach which allows a large number of people live vertically on a piece of land, but nevertheless to move these people up and down on a daily basis. Large amounts of energy are consumed in vertical transportation, and perhaps wasted in the process as well in addition to the energy used for pumping water to the highest floors, besides the safety issue in case of fire. In the context of renewable energy in areas where wind speeds are reasonable, these high-rise buildings could be utilised to generate electrical energy from wind turbines thereby reducing carbon emissions. This chapter covers nine areas notably: (a) high-rise buildings and climate change adaptation; (b) the world’s oldest high-rise building: Giza Pyramids; (c) high-rise building metaphors in the context of planning within the urban structure; (d) high-rise buildings, energy consumption and comfort; (e) would high-rise building lead to reduction in CO₂ emissions?; (f) analysing the appropriate size of high-rise building in the context of the environment in Cairo; (g) evaluation of daily services and risks: a real story; (h) positive or negative assessment of one of the high-rise buildings in Cairo, Egypt; and (i) lessons learned and conclusions.