MOIRAE – bottom-up MOdel to compute the energy consumption of the Italian REsidential sector: Model design, validation and evaluation of electrification pathways

Abstract

This paper presents a novel bottom-up modeling approach (MOIRAE) to compute the thermal and electrical energy consumptions of the residential sector, which is later applied to the Italian case. First, the structure of the model has been designed and the energy balance models for the electrical and thermal appliances have been described. The energy balance models have been applied to the micro-data offered by the Italian Institute of Statistics (ISTAT), consisting of a statistical-nationwide-representative sample and providing a comprehensive description of all the Italian households. Subsequently, MOIRAE performance has been assessed considering both global and local validations. On one hand, from a global point of view, MOIRAE has been validated by comparing the numerical outcomes (thermal and electrical energy consumptions) with historical national aggregated data. On the other hand, from a local point of view, MOIRAE has been validated by comparing the numerical outcomes with available micro-data, describing energy expenditure of the different households. Finally, MOIRAE has been employed to elucidate the electrification pathways for the Italian residential sector, aiming at replacing the natural gas, LPG, diesel and fuel oil energy carriers with electrical energy.