Assessment of the Impact of Occupants’ Behavior and Climate Change on Heating and Cooling Energy Needs of Buildings

Gianmarco Fajilla,Luisa F Cabeza,Luís Bragança,Marilena De Simone

doi:10.3390/en13236468

Gianmarco Fajilla, Luisa F Cabeza + Show 2 more

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https://doi.org/10.3390/en13236468

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Abstract

Energy performance of buildings is a worldwide increasing investigated field, due to ever more stringent energy standards aimed at reducing the buildings’ impact on the environment. The purpose of this paper is to assess the impact that occupant behavior and climate change have on the heating and cooling needs of residential buildings. With this aim, data of a questionnaire survey delivered in Southern Italy were used to obtain daily use profiles of natural ventilation, heating, and cooling, both in winter and in summer. Three climatic scenarios were investigated: The current scenario (2020), and two future scenarios (2050 and 2080). The CCWorldWeatherGen tool was used to create the weather files of future climate scenarios, and DesignBuilder was applied to conduct dynamic energy simulations. Firstly, the results obtained for 2020 demonstrated how the occupants’ preferences related to the use of natural ventilation, heating, and cooling systems (daily schedules and temperature setpoints) impact on energy needs. Heating energy needs appeared more affected by the heating schedules, while cooling energy needs were mostly influenced by both natural ventilation and usage schedules. Secondly, due to the temperature rise, substantial decrements of the energy needs for heating and increments of cooling energy needs were observed in all the future scenarios where in addition, the impact of occupant behavior appeared amplified.

Highlights

In most developed countries, buildings are the major energy consumers, and they may not be able to reach the new energy standards [1,2]
As recognized by the Energy Performance of Buildings Directive (EPBD) [4], buildings are responsible for 40% of the total energy consumption and 36% of global annual greenhouse gas emissions [3,5,6,7]; these consumptions could drastically increase double or even triple by 2050 if not faced in the right way [8]
In 2020, the heating energy needs were more influenced by heating schedules than ventilation profiles, and values of the order of 2000 kWh, 1000 kWh, and 700 kWh were registered for the continuous and the two intermittent operations, respectively

Summary

Introduction

Buildings are the major energy consumers, and they may not be able to reach the new energy standards [1,2]. In the EU, most of the buildings have more than twenty years and present low energy performance [1]: The percentage of well-designed buildings is less than 2%, with almost 60% of heating systems inefficient and almost 40% of the windows being single glazed [3]. As recognized by the Energy Performance of Buildings Directive (EPBD) [4], buildings are responsible for 40% of the total energy consumption and 36% of global annual greenhouse gas emissions [3,5,6,7]; these consumptions could drastically increase double or even triple by 2050 if not faced in the right way [8]. Governments worldwide have implemented energy requirements in their building regulations to reduce levels of energy consumed by buildings and to promote more energy-efficient envelopes and systems [9].

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