Abstract
One of the greatest challenges facing the European Union is the conversion of the existing residential building stock into nearly zero-energy buildings (NZEBs) by 2050 through energy renovation, given that the residential sector is one of the largest consumers of final energy and that approximately two-thirds of existing dwellings were built before 1980. The objective of this study is to assess the energy, environmental, and economic impacts of the energy renovation of thermal envelopes of existing multi-family buildings in the hot and temperate climate zones of Spain by using life cycle cost analysis (LCCA) to determine the optimal thicknesses of insulation to be added to the walls, roof, and first floor framework of the buildings and replacing existing building openings to achieve NZEBs. Four thermal insulation materials are considered with four different heating and cooling systems and ten different models. With the methodology developed, the best energy renovation solutions are estimated and then thermally simulated. In total, 67 of the 576 proposed energy renovation solutions achieve NZEBs. This study fills in the gap between LCCA estimates and reality.
Highlights
In 2018, the final energy consumption in the European Union reached 283.2 Mtoe in the residential sector and 151.6 Mtoe in the service sector, with 41.0% of the final energy consumption coming from the building sector [1]
This study evaluates the optimum insulation thicknesses to be added to the walls, roof, and first floor framework (FFF) of the thermal envelope of the study building that minimize the total heating costs, total cooling costs, and total heating and cooling costs of the energy renovation in each combined climate zone considering four different insulation materials (EPS, mineral wool (MW), PUR, and XPS) and four different systems
Refers to the climate zone, January climate zones (JCZs) refers to the January climate zone, Sx refers to the system used (S1, S2, S3 or S4), Insu refers to the thermal insulation material (EPS, MW, PUR, or XPS) and OC refers to the optimization criteria (H for heating, C for cooling, or HC for heating and cooling)
Summary
In 2018, the final energy consumption in the European Union reached 283.2 Mtoe in the residential sector and 151.6 Mtoe in the service sector, with 41.0% of the final energy consumption coming from the building sector [1]. In the renovation of the residential building stock, one of the most effective methods to reduce both the heating and cooling energy demands is to increase the thermal insulation of the opaque elements of the thermal envelope [6,7,8]. The vast majority of these studies were focused on external walls, but Sisman et al [15] determined the optimum insulation thickness for both walls and roofs, and López-Ochoa et al [12] and Evin and Ucar [20]
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