Over- and underconsumption of residential heating: Analyzing occupant impacts on performance gaps between calculated and actual heating demand

Abstract

Previous research estimates that building physics and occupant practices equally contribute to the explanation of variations in residential heating consumption. However, the so-called performance gap, where calculated heating demand diverge from actual heating consumption, indicates that the relation between occupant practices and building physics vary across energy efficiency of the building. In this paper, using data from 2019 to 2021, we investigate such interactions 1) by comparing the calculated heating demand with actual energy consumption for residential space heating and domestic hot water (DHW) across energy performance certificates (A to G), and 2) by investigating variations in over- and underconsumption (deviance from calculated to actual) across socio-economic characteristics of households. In line with previous studies, we find that households living in energy inefficient houses tend to have lower heating demand than expected. Moreover, we find that lower-income households and households living in rural area has less overconsumption, indicating that they have more frugal heating practices.