Energy efficiency of residential buildings in the European Union – An exploratory analysis of cross-country consumption patterns

Thonipara, Anita; Runst, Petrik; Ochsner, Christian; Bizer, Kilian

doi:10.1016/j.enpol.2019.03.003

Cited by 55 publications

(30 citation statements)

References 16 publications

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“…In terms of energy consumption, research from the European Union estimated the energy consumption in residential [10] and non-residential buildings [11]. The results indicate the effectiveness in reducing energy consumption and improving energy efficiency by incentive policies and strict regulations, which can encourage owners to adopt certain technologies or energy-saving measures.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Retrofitted Existing Residential Building Design in Energy and Economic Aspect According to Thailand Building Energy Code

et al. 2021

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Electrical energy usage in buildings is a challenging issue because many old buildings were not originally built to achieve energy efficiency. Thus, retrofitting old buildings to net-zero buildings can benefit both the owner and electric utilities. In this study, the BEC (building energy code) software was used to evaluate energy aspects of retrofitted buildings in compliance with Thailand’s building energy code to achieve a net-zero energy building. In addition, economic aspects were also studied to verify the feasibility for a project’s owner to invest in a retrofitted existing building. An existing residential building in Thailand was used as a case study. The results in terms of energy after retrofitting existing buildings into net-zero energy buildings show that the total energy consumption can be reduced by 49.36%. From an economic perspective, the investment cost for a retrofitted building can be compensated by energy saving in terms of discounted payback period (DPP) for approximately 4.36 years and has an IRR (internal rate of return) value of 19.23%. This result evidences the potential in both energy and economy for a project’s owner to invest in a retrofitted existing building in compliance with the building code, with potential for implementation with benefits on both electrical utilities and the project’s owner.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Retrofitted Existing Residential Building Design in Energy and Economic Aspect According to Thailand Building Energy Code

et al. 2021

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“…The reality, however, is millions of buildings waste energy and provide inadequate comfort—even in mild climates. Current policies in this sector consist of a myriad of detailed regulations concerning, e.g., insulation or window glazing but it is often hard to judge their effectiveness (Ó Broin et al 2019a ; Thonipara et al 2019 ). When energy is cheap, the incentive to be consistent in saving energy is weak and thus pricing policy can be an important complement to existing policies.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Saving energy in residential buildings: the role of energy pricing

et al. 2021

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A zero-carbon society requires dramatic change everywhere including in buildings, a large and politically sensitive sector. Technical possibilities exist but implementation is slow. Policies include many hard-to-evaluate regulations and may suffer from rebound mechanisms. We use dynamic econometric analysis of European macro data for the period 1990–2018 to systematically examine the importance of changes in energy prices and income on residential energy demand. We find a long-run price elasticity of −0.5. The total long-run income elasticity is around 0.9, but if we control for the increase in income that goes towards larger homes and other factors, the income elasticity is 0.2. These findings have practical implications for climate policy and the EU buildings and energy policy framework.

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“…[7][8][9] In November 2018, The European Commission has already commitment to reduce at least 40% of GHG emissions below to 1990 levels while improving energy efficiency by 32.5%, and increasing the renewable energy sources to 32%. 10,11 To achieve these targets, researchers, architects, and building engineers are focused on reducing the building energy consumption, carbon emissions, and using and storing renewable energy sources. 7,9,12 Solar energy provides clean energy, which is abundantly available for whole year.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Phase change material impregnated wood for passive thermal management of timber buildings

et al. 2020

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The Scots pine (Pinus sylvestris L.) sapwood was impregnated with the eutectic mixture of capric acid (CA) and stearic acid (SA) as phase change material (PCM) via vacuum process for passive thermoregulation in timber buildings. The hygroscopic properties, mechanical properties, thermal energy storage (TES) characteristics and lab-scale thermo-regulative performance of wood/ CA-SA composite were evaluated. The produced composite from PCM was morphologically and physico-chemically characterized by SEM, FT-IR and XRD analysis. Thermal energy storage (TES) properties, cycling chemical/thermal reliability, and thermal degradation stability of the produced composite were determined by TG/DTA and DSC analysis. The hygroscopic tests revealed that the wood/CA-SA composite showed low water absorption (WA) and high anti-swelling efficiency (ASE) after 264 hours in water. Wood treatment with CA-SA increased the bending and compression strength of wood. TG/DTA data demonstrated that the wood/CA-SA composite left higher residue of 10.31% at 800 C than that of wood with 6.87%. The DSC measurements showed that the obtained wood/CA-SA composite had a good TES capacity of about 94 J/g at 23.94 C. The cycling DSC results confirmed the eutectic PCM in wood indicated high chemical stability and storage/release reliability even though it was run 600 times melt/freeze. According to thermal performance test, the wood/CA-SA composite has ability of storing excess heat in the environment and preventing the heat flow to the environment. It can be concluded that the fabricated wood/CA-SA composite can be used for indoor temperature regulation and energy saving in timber buildings.

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Energy efficiency of residential buildings in the European Union – An exploratory analysis of cross-country consumption patterns

Cited by 55 publications

References 16 publications

Retrofitted Existing Residential Building Design in Energy and Economic Aspect According to Thailand Building Energy Code

Retrofitted Existing Residential Building Design in Energy and Economic Aspect According to Thailand Building Energy Code

Saving energy in residential buildings: the role of energy pricing

Phase change material impregnated wood for passive thermal management of timber buildings

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