Climate Change and Buildings Energy Efficiency – the Key Role of Residents

Abstract

-Eastern Europe today is confronted with an unavoidable problem -the multifamily apartment building stock is deteriorating but apartment owners do not have sufficient access to resources be they organizational, financial, technical or legal. In addition, destructive myths have grown about the Soviet era buildings despite their continued resilience or the ex-GDR experience in the 90s with the same buildings. Further, without resources, decision making in residential apartments is seen as a major obstacle and used as an explanation why renovation has not taken place in Latvia. This is important not only in the context of a potential housing crisis but also because the renovation of the apartment buildings is an effective solution to significantly reduce the energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions. It has a proven potential to effectively finance the long term renovation of these buildings. This paper summarizes the first findings of a comprehensive and in-depth study of apartment buildings, their owners and the processes relating to renovation, combining social and environmental engineering research methods. It seeks to understand how owners of multi-family buildings in Eastern Europe understand their buildings and then to answer two questions -how to motivate owners to renovate their homes and increase energy efficiency and what business models should be used to implement economically viable and high quality projects.

An Attempt to Design a Naturally Ventilated Tower in Subtropical Climate of the Developing Country; Pakistan

“…To manage this risk, a separate computer have to be resourced from departmental help and also a cloud simulation engine was used. Nevertheless, the tool is highly recommended for small scale studies where CFD can also be used for better natural ventilation analysis as carried out by [19] also in a developing country; Iran.…”

Study of Integrated Social Vulnerability Index SoVIint of Hilly Region of Uttarakhand, India

“…On a regional scale, deforestation and urbanization have recognizable impacts on regional rainfall patterns and are also associated with the appearance of aridity [24]. Any factor vulnerable to environment adversely affects climate, especially the faster growth of urban areas and construction of high floor buildings [25], [26]. A thorough study associated with environmental vulnerability is needed for the better future climatic condition.…”

Impact of economical mechanisms on CO2 emissions from non-ETS district heating in Latvia using system dynamic approach

“…This represents a decrease from 157.67 kWh/m 2 in 2014. There is a limited success in renovating older apartment buildings because of legal problems and a shortage of resources [25].…”

“…This means that 505 thousand m 2 of apartment buildings can be renovated each year. In total, there are 61 million m 2 of households in Latvia [25]. It was assumed that after building renovation, the average space heating consumption will be 70 kWh/m 2 , which is the level of heat consumption in those apartment buildings in Latvia that have already been renovated.…”