Impacts of climate change on the cooling loads of residential buildings differences between occupants with different age

Abstract

Climate Change is known to have a great impact on the energy consumption in buildings. This paper studied the cooling load of a residential building in Jinan, China, in 2020, 2050, 2080 by considering the impacts of climate change on the influential parameters for cooling loads. The Hadley Centre Coupled Model 3(HadCM3) was employed to investigate the impact of climate change on the outdoor temperature, solar radiation and wind speed. In addition, this study also differentiated the cooling loads according to occupants’ age, since the energy usage patterns and the requirements on cooling loads are closely related to occupants’ age. The results suggest that climate change will create significant impacts on the cooling loads in residential buildings. Regarding occupants’ age, the impact on the occupants under 55-year-old is larger than the people older than 55.