Energy performance and occupancy satisfaction

Abstract

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to present research that analyses the energy performance and occupancy satisfaction in two very similar buildings that have been designed, constructed and are in use by one government department within the UK.Design/methodology/approachThe work presented applies post occupancy evaluation (POE), metered data and benchmarking to evaluate the two case study buildings.FindingsFindings are related to a (BRE environmental assessment method) BREEAM assessment that was undertaken for one building, but not for the other. Results show that these closely related cases have similar occupancy satisfaction levels, but rather different energy performance. This last aspect is thought to be due to differences in functions of the buildings. Surprisingly, the use of a BREEAM assessment during the design stage has not contributed to making the case involved more energy efficient.Research limitations/implicationsThis paper only compares two cases, with all inherent limitations. The methodology is limited to POE and metered data; no full monitoring or thermal simulation efforts have been conducted at this stage.Practical implicationsThe project demonstrates that very similar buildings might perform differently. Findings raise some questions over the impact that can be expected from BREEAM ratings.Originality/valueThe study of two closely related buildings provides interesting information to practitioners on factors that might be underrated in current design methods and performance assessment ratings.

An analysis of occupants response to thermal discomfort in green and conventional buildings in New Zealand

“…This is supported by other studies that found high discomfort issues in green buildings where occupants find it too cold during the winter and too hot during the summer [9][10][11][12]. Occupants will perform environmental adjustment buildings when they are experiencing discomfort in thermal, daylight and natural ventilation in the building [13][14][15][16][17].…”

“…The results in this study supports Moezzi and Goins [33] where building managers in green buildings had also discouraged the occupants in the buildings to use personal fans or heaters. Findings from previous studies have shown that occupants change energy usage in green building to achieve comfort [14,17,23,40]. The results in this paper shows that although occupants take actions that may impact energy usage of green (TB and OGGB) buildings, the level of practice is significantly less when compared to conventional (FoE and OCH) buildings.…”

“…Inefficient operation of the building control systems are described in the following studies. For example, Gabe [24] and Sawyer et al [17] discovered that occupants increased the load of the cooling and heating systems to accommodate comfort. Reiss [16] discovered that occupants routinely override switches for natural ventilation or mechanical cooling because they don't know what conditions each option is intended for.…”

“…use personal fan, heater, and etc) [23,25,27,28] adjusting posture [25] consuming hot or cold food and drinks [14,23,25,26,28] moving to a different location [14,[23][24][25][27][28][29][30]] taking a walk inside or outside [14,26] contact building manager [14] share the problem with co-workers to see if they are also experiencing discomfort [14] to achieve optimum comfort [16,23,26]. Studies have also found that occupants' desire to achieve optimum comfort caused controls to be overridden, such as mechanical cooling and heating systems [16,17,24]. Against the need to change controls, Heerwagen and Diamond [14] suggest that an adverse impact of providing good automated building control systems is the "desk couch potato" where there may be a lack of muscle movement, and an increase of social isolation.…”

Energy-related standards and UK speculative office development

“…EPCs were intended to incentivize highly energy-efficient buildings, but are undone by the 'performance gap'. BREEAM's central market position as an indicator of sustainability does not mean that certification necessarily guarantees energy performance (De Wilde, 2014), something predicted by the 'Energy' credits being based on EPC ratings (Roderick et al, 2009), and confirmed in like-for-like post-occupancy comparison (Haroglu, 2012;Sawyer, de Wilde, & Turpin-Brooks, 2008).…”