Performance Analysis of Green Building with Natural Stone Coating Wall in the Black Sea Region

Abstract

This study presents an integrated numerical and multi-criteria decision-making framework to evaluate and optimize building envelope designs for energy efficiency under the climatic conditions of the Black Sea Region, Turkey. A total of 108 alternative wall configurations were systematically generated by combining three wall types, five natural stone claddings, and two insulation materials. High-resolution thermal simulations were conducted using ANSYS to assess temperature distribution and heat transfer behavior across the building envelope under fixed indoor thermal comfort conditions. The simulation results were first evaluated from an energy-performance perspective, revealing that wall systems incorporating aerated concrete, EPS insulation, and Niğde marble cladding, particularly in sandwich configurations, exhibited the most favorable thermal behavior, while configurations using Giresun granite showed the poorest energy performance due to higher thermal conductivity. To complement the energy-focused analysis, an Analytic Hierarchy Approach (AHP) was applied as a multi-criteria material selection tool, integrating mechanical and durability-related properties together with thermal conductivity. Under this broader evaluation framework, Giresun granite was ranked as the optimal material owing to its superior mechanical performance, despite its unfavorable thermal behavior. The results demonstrate that material optimality in building envelope design is inherently context-dependent. While Niğde marble is preferable for energy-efficient envelope applications, Giresun granite becomes dominant when mechanical durability and long-term performance are prioritized. The combined use of ANSYS simulations and AHP provides a robust, transparent, and adaptable decision-support methodology for context-specific building envelope design.



Received: 11 December 2025 | Revised: 5 March 2026 | Accepted: 23 March 2026



Conflicts of Interest

The authors declare that they have no conflicts of interest to this work.



Data Availability Statement

Data are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.



Author Contribution Statement

Figen Balo: Conceptualization, Methodology, Validation, Formal analysis, Investigation, Resources, Data curation, Writing - original draft, Writing - review & editing, Visualization, Supervision, Project administration. Ünal Yılmaz: Software.