Building Energy Consumption In China Research Articles

Comparative analysis of energy efficiency for three heating and cooling supply schemes in a region with hot summers and cold winters in a chemical industrial park

Building energy consumption in China accounts for 45% of the total national energy consumption, with air conditioning energy consumption representing approximately two-thirds of that. Therefore, energy efficiency in buildings is of utmost importance. This study focuses on a chemical industrial park located along the Fujiang River and compares three heating and cooling supply schemes: the river water source heat pump system, which utilizes river water as the heat source and heat sink; the water cooling unit and boiler system, which uses water-cooled electric compression chillers for cooling and an oil-fired boiler system for heating; and the split air conditioning and gas water heater scheme, which relies on refrigerants such as fluorine-containing compounds for cooling and a gas water heater for heating. By calculating the energy consumption of the above three schemes and conducting a comparative analysis, it is found that the river water source heat pump system exhibits significantly higher energy efficiency throughout the year compared to the water cooling unit and boiler system and the split air conditioning and gas water heater scheme. This highlights the notable energy efficiency advantage of the river water source heat pump system.

Effect of connection methods on hygrothermal performance of prefabricated concrete building walls

With the ongoing surge in global energy demand and the escalating environmental concerns, attention has turned to building energy consumption in numerous countries. According to a 2019 report by the International Energy Agency (IEA), the global building industry is responsible for 36 % of energy consumption, ranking first among all industries. The 2022 China Building Energy Consumption and Carbon Emissions Research Report highlighted that in 2020, China's building energy consumption and carbon emissions represented 45.5 % and 50.9 % of the national total, respectively. Achieving carbon neutrality now hinges on decarbonizing buildings. Prefabricated buildings, as a prime example of industrialized construction, aid in reducing carbon emissions through standardized, factory-based production. However, unlike conventional construction, prefabricated concrete buildings (the dominant form of prefabricated buildings) employ metal connectors to join the prefabricated components. These metal connectors generate thermal bridges that can influence heat and moisture transfer through the walls. In this study, a coupled heat and moisture transfer model will be established to analyze the influence of different connection methods on the hygrothermal performance in prefabricated concrete building envelopes. Two typical connection methods for prefabricated buildings are mainly investigated: the grouted sleeve connection and the bolted connection. The findings indicate that different connection methods for prefabricated building connectors increase both the heat and moisture transfer rates in prefabricated concrete structures. Compared to the grouted sleeve connection method, the bolt connection method has a more significant impact on the thermal and moisture performance of the wall. In the tests on the T-shaped structure, the grouted sleeve connections increase heat transfer by 9%–10 %, while the bolt connections increase it by 52%–55 %. During summer, the bolt connections show a 7.42 % higher moisture transfer than the grouted sleeve connections, whereas, in winter, the bolt connections reduce moisture transfer by 12.4 % more than the grouted sleeve connections.

Uncertainty of energy consumption and CO2 emissions in the building sector in China

Uncertainty is a major concern in projecting the energy consumption and CO2 emissions from buildings with implications for the formulation of mitigation and adaptation measures. Due to multiple uncertainties, it is difficult to assess how the energy consumption of buildings in China and the associated CO2 emissions will develop in the coming decades. Aiming to give a more accurate picture of the uncertainty of the driving factors, we develop a bottom-up national energy technology model for building sector (NET-Building) to depict the evolutionary trajectories of energy consumption and CO2 emissions in China's building sector by considering the uncertainty of future evolution trends of key variables that affecting the energy consumption and CO2 emissions. The results show that China's building energy consumption and CO2 emissions will peak in 2025–2040 and 2025–2035, with peak energy consumption and CO2 emissions varying from 742–1585 Mtce and 2238–4211 Mt, respectively. Meanwhile, the electricity consumption in the building sector in China will reach 2515–7242 TWh by 2050, indicating a large variation range caused by uncertainties.

Research on carbon emission peak prediction and path of China’s public buildings: Scenario analysis based on LEAP model

The building sector is an important field of energy consumption and carbon emission. Public buildings currently account for the majority of building energy consumption in China. But at present, there is a lack of research on the potential carbon peak and time of public buildings. Therefore, this research focuses on carbon peak prediction and path of China's public buildings based on the LEAP model. Firstly, a carbon emission prediction framework is proposed with the assistance of the LEAP model. Subsequently, according to the historical development of key factors, various carbon emission scenarios of public buildings are established, taking into account energy efficiency improvement and energy transition measures. The key findings obtained from the analysis of these scenarios are as follows: (1) Limiting the building space can help to achieve carbon peak, however, in the benchmark scenario, public buildings are unable to do so. (2) Both the moderate emission reduction scenario and the peak emission reduction scenario can meet the target of carbon peaking by 2030, and in the peak emission reduction scenario, the public construction sector may almost reach carbon neutrality by 2060. (3) The peak time can be advanced by boosting energy efficiency of new buildings, energy conservation of existing buildings, renewable energy application and power grid cleaning. (4) Both independent measures of the public construction sector and external measures are essential, with power grid cleaning making the most significant contribution to carbon neutrality in public buildings. Finally, this research provides policy recommendations to support public buildings in achieving their carbon emission reduction goals, which not only has the potential to improve carbon emission forecasting in the construction sector, but can also provide useful reference for relevant decision makers.

Revisiting the building energy consumption in China: Insights from a large-scale national survey

The increasing building energy consumption in China has been acknowledged as a key concern in future climate mitigation and sustainable development. Though reliable accounting of energy consumption is the prerequisite, estimates of China's building energy consumption remain subject to large discrepancies. One of the primary causes of these disparities is an inaccurate estimation of building energy intensities due to flaws in estimation methods and data. Here, we present a bottom-up approach and use large-scale nationwide building energy survey data (covering 30 provinces, four different types of buildings, and district heating from 2009 to 2016) to correct the existing, widely used assumption of normal distribution for building energy intensity and provide a more accurate estimate of building energy consumption in China. Our improved estimate of China's building energy consumption differs by −10% to 36% from existing mainstream estimates, indicating a significant bias in existing research and applications.

Predicting Building Energy Consumption with a New Grey Model

Based on the existing grey prediction model, this paper proposes a new grey prediction model (the fractional discrete grey model, FDGM (1, 1, t α )), introduces the modeling mechanism and characteristics of the FDGM (1, 1, t α ), and uses three groups of data to verify its effectiveness compared with that of other grey models. This paper forecasts the building energy consumption in China over the next five years based on the idea of metabolism. The results show that the FDGM (1, 1, t α ) can be transformed into other grey models through parameter setting changes, so the new model has strong adaptability. The FDGM (1, 1, t α ) is more reliable and effective than the other six compared grey models. From 2018 to 2022, the total energy consumption levels of civil buildings, urban civil buildings, and civil buildings specifically in Beijing will exhibit steady upward trends, with an average annual growth rate of 2.61%, 1.92%, and 0.78%, respectively.

Study on the Passive Heating System of a Heated Cooking Wall in Dwellings: A Case Study of Traditional Dwellings in Southern Shaanxi, China.

In China, research on winter heating and energy saving for residential buildings mainly focuses on urban residences rather than rural ones. According to the 2018 China Building Energy Consumption Research Report, rural residential buildings emit about 423 million tons of carbon, accounting for 21% of the country’s total carbon emissions. According to the research on China’s greenhouse gas inventory, the main sources of carbon emissions in rural areas are from cooking and the burning of fuelwood and biomass for heating in winter. In this study, the southern Shaanxi area, which is hot in summer and cold in winter, was selected as the research site, and a fire wall system was planned that combines cooking and heating facilities in residential buildings. The system uses the heat generated by cooking and the heat storage capacity of the wall, as well as the principle of thermal radiation and heat convection, to increase the indoor temperature. The advantage is that the hot air generated is mainly concentrated in the inside of the wall, which reduces the direct contact with the cold outdoor air and avoids excess heat loss. In this study, in addition to considering the influence of the cooking fire wall system on the indoor temperature, the difference in the outer wall with or without solar thermal radiation was also considered. The research results show that the use of a cooking fire wall heating system reduces the annual heat load of the building to 440.8318 KW·h, which is a reduction rate of 7.91%. When there is solar radiation on the outer wall, the annual thermal load of the building is reduced by 1104.723 kW·h, and the reduction rate is 19.84%.

Modelling building energy consumption in China under different future scenarios

Building energy use is becoming increasingly important in China. Despite a rapid growth in recent years, energy use intensity in China is still relatively low compared to other advanced economies; thus, there is still substantial room for it to increase as living standards and industrial services are improved. It is therefore important to focus on the future development of building energy use by considering new trends in the building and energy sectors, as well as the role of occupant behavior. This study uses the China Building Energy Model (CBEM) to model China’s building energy consumption and carbon emissions up to 2050 for different scenarios based on these considerations. The results indicate that building energy use will be 80% higher than the current situation if the strategies of the 13th Five-Year Plan are maintained and approximately 10% higher if stronger strategies toward energy efficiency are employed. Carbon emissions are predicted to peak around 2020 to 2035. The contributions of key strategies in different subsectors are also discussed. This research suggests that, through the use of suitable strategies and policies, energy use and carbon emissions in China’s building sector can achieve the combined goals of energy revolution and climate change mitigation.

Forecasting the Building Energy Consumption in China Using Grey Model

The consumption of energy is receiving increasing attention and the building energy consumption is an important component of this. However, buildings in China, a developing country, consume large amounts of energy, and the accurate prediction of building energy consumption is particularly important for its reduction. The buildings causing energy consumption are divided into three types (i.e., rural, public and urban buildings). Using data from the period 2001–2016, the grey model was applied to predict the building energy consumption, the building area and the building energy consumption per unit area of the three building types in 2017–2020. According to the forecasting results, the energy consumption per unit area of rural buildings, public buildings and the total building energy consumption per unit area will show an increasing trend at varying degrees in 2017–2020. This indicates that the existing problems of building energy consumption have not been effectively solved. Based on the forecasting results, the problems of the building energy consumption are summarized and solutions are proposed.

Realization of Building Energy Saving and Solar Heating in Cold Areas based on Computer Technology

The climate of cold area is cold in winter (the average temperature of the coldest month is 0 ∼ - 10 °C and < - 10 °C), the outer envelope of the building bears the interference of low temperature, wind and snow, hot in summer, and the outer envelope of the building bears the interference of high temperature, solar radiation and rain. Therefore, the design of buildings should meet the requirements of winter heat preservation, cold prevention and antifreeze. At present, 95% of the new buildings built every year in China are still high energy consumption buildings. The heating energy consumption per unit building area is about three times of that in countries with similar climate. The building energy consumption in China accounts for nearly 30% of the national energy consumption. With the development of building technology, the improvement of people’s awareness of energy and the attention of government departments, China should vigorously develop building energy saving, which is urgent. The demand of solar energy is increasing day by day, and the situation of energy utilization is tense. However, the large-scale use of conventional energy will have a negative impact on the environment. As a kind of renewable energy, solar energy is inexhaustible and will not increase the environmental load. It will become an important part of the future energy structure. In the building energy consumption, the energy consumption of domestic hot water and heating accounts for a considerable proportion. Using solar energy to meet the requirements of low-grade energy consumption, such as domestic hot water and heating, has great energy-saving benefits. Therefore, solar energy heating technology has been paid more and more attention. At the same time, with the development and maturity of computer technology, it also provides more support for solar heating technology. This paper analyzes the realization of building energy saving and solar heating in cold areas by using computer technology.

Impact of zero energy buildings on medium-to-long term building energy consumption in China

The future development pathway of upgrading building energy codes in China remains unclear. No studies have addressed the impacts of Zero Energy Building (ZEB) on medium-to-long term building energy consumption. By reviewing the development and enforcement of building energy codes in China in the last 30 years (1986–2016), together with the analysis of energy consumption of ultra-low energy building and nearly-zero energy building (nearly-ZEB) demonstration projects (2012–2017), this study proposes a three-definition hierarchy of ultra-low energy buildings, nearly-ZEB and ZEB as the successive building energy codes upgrading goals towards 2050. Six scenarios, BAU to leapfrog scenarios, are developed to study the building energy consumption from 2025 to 2050. The results show that the peak of the building energy consumption decreases and the occurrence time advances. In general, only if the ultra-low energy building, nearly-ZEB and ZEB account for more than 50% of total floor area does the building energy consumption begin to decrease. In moderate development scenario, which is most likely to occur, the peak will appear in 2035 with the amount of 567 million tce. Compared to BAU scenario, in leapfrog scenario, the accumulated saving of fossil fuels can be reduced by up to 9380 million tce till 2050, which contributes most to mitigation of climate change.

Applying support vector machines to predict building energy consumption in China

It is increasingly significant to predict building energy consumption (BEC) in energy-saving decision making. This paper presents the method of support vector machines (SVM) to forecast building energy consumption in China. To improve the reliability of SVM in building energy consumption prediction, multiple parameters including weather data such as yearly mean outdoor dry-bulb temperature, relative humidity and global solar radiation and economic factors such as the ratio of urbanization, gross domestic product, household consumption level and total area of structure are taken as inputs. The performance of SVM with respect to two parameters, c and g, is explored using the k-fold cross validation with grid searching method based on radial-basis function kernel. Finally, the performance of the proposed model is checked by comparing the prediction model with statistic data taken from Chinese National Bureau of Statistics in 30 provinces (including autonomous regions and municipalities) of China using statistical error tests such as the mean square error (MSE) and the squared correlation coefficient (r2). With the analysis based on statistical error tests, the results show that the SVM method can estimate the building energy consumption with good accuracy with MSE less than 1E-3 and r2 more than 0.991.

Research on Application of Solar Semiconductor Cold Wall in Near-Zero Energy Buildings

With the speeding up of urbanization and growth of national economy, housing industry has developed rapidly in recent years, the residential building energy saving problem has been increasingly outstanding, according to the study, the future China building energy consumption ratio will rise to about 35%. At present, building energy conservation has become one of the recognized effective ways to solve the increasingly serious energy problems. Through the study of the near zero energy building in the hot summer and cold winter area，the thermal comfort of the near zero energy building was satisfied by using the semiconductor cold and hot wall system，the practical effect and operation parameters of the semiconductor cooling wall were given. It was presents a series of Suggestions and improvement Suggestions for the research and energy conservation work of near zero energy buildings in hot summer and cold winter area.

Integrated utilization of fly ash and waste glass for synthesis of foam/dense bi-layered insulation ceramic tile

Due to the numerous increase of the building energy consumption in China, the development of thermal insulation materials is quite needed. Herein a novel foam/dense bi-layered insulation ceramic tile was fabricated using high alumina fly ash and waste glass as the main raw materials. Overall a two-step preparation method was employed, including a single-loading pressing and a single-sintering process, which greatly reduced the cost and production cycle. The influence of process parameters, namely the sintering temperature and the chemical composition, on the microstructure and mechanical properties of bi-layered insulation ceramic tiles was investigated. The experimental results showed that the proposed foam/dense bi-layered insulation ceramic tiles had excellent macro and micro properties. Furthermore, the simulation results indicated that the preparation of bi-layered insulation ceramic tile made up a promising strategy for recycling industrial waste into new kind of building insulation materials.

China's energy consumption in the building sector: A Statistical Yearbook-Energy Balance Sheet based splitting method

Abstract China's energy consumption in the building sector (BEC) is not counted as a separate type of energy consumption, but divided and mixed in other sectors in China's statistical system. This led to the lack of historical data on China's BEC. Moreover, previous researches' shortages such as unsystematic research on BEC, various estimation methods with complex calculation process, and difficulties in data acquisition resulted in “heterogeneous” of current BEC in China. Aiming to these deficiencies, this study proposes a set of China building energy consumption calculation method (CBECM) by splitting out the building related energy consumption mixed in other sectors in the composition of China Statistical Yearbook-Energy Balance Sheet. Then, China's BEC from 2000 to 2014 are estimated using CBECM and compared with other studies. Results show that, from 2000 to 2014, China's BEC increased 1.7 times, rising from 301 to 814 million tons of standard coal consumed, with the BEC percentage of total energy consumption stayed relatively stable between 17.7% and 20.3%. By comparison, we find that our results are reliable and the CBECM has the following advantages over other methods: data source is authoritative, calculation process is concise, and it is easy to obtain time series data on BEC etc. The CBECM is particularly suitable for the provincial government to calculate the local BEC, even in the circumstance with statistical yearbook available only.

Which activities contribute most to building energy consumption in China? A hybrid LMDI decomposition analysis from year 2007 to 2015

This paper proposed a hybrid Logarithmic Mean Divisia Index (LMDI) model that decomposes the change of total energy consumption (TEC) in the building sector to three different dimensions: 1) key influencing effects that include area effect, structure effect, population intensity, value intensity, and energy intensity; 2) three phases that include material production, construction, and operation; and 3) geographically distributed regions. Then, the model was validated in China's building sector based on the data collected from 30 provinces during 2007–2015. The key findings show that: (1) the increased final energy consumption in the building industry accounted for 53.3% of that in China. (2) Building material production contributed the most (69.2%) to the energy changes, followed by building operation (29.6%) and construction (1.2%). (3) The change of TEC was attributed the most to the area effect (90.4%) and the energy intensity effect (42.4%). (4) Zhejiang, Jiangsu, Hubei, Hebei, Fujian and Shandong contributed the most (47%) to the increase of China's building energy use. These findings provide an insightful understanding of the building energy changes and also a quantifiable justification for making building-specific energy policies, which are discussed at the end of the study.

Study and analysis of office building energy consumption performance in severe cold and cold region, China

Large office building energy consumption in China is several times that of ordinary buildings. Therefore, it is necessary to study the characteristics of large office buildings to determine their e...

Climate Change Adaptation Pathways for Residential Buildings in Southern China

Abstract China Building energy consumption contributes about 30% to the total national greenhouse-gas (GHG) emissions, and thus, to climate change. At the same time, climate change will in turn impact the total energy consumption and GHG emissions of residential sector. This study investigated the potential impact of climate change on the total energy consumption and related GHG emissions of housing in Southern China. Identified potential pathways were implemented for existing and new residential buildings to adapt to climate change. Results show that the ambient temperatures in 2020s, 2050s and 2080s will increase by 0.82 oC, 1.91 oC and 3.41 oC accordingly. The total heating and cooling energy use of 3.5 and 5.5 star-buildings are projected to increase 25% and 20% respectively with a 1.0 oC global warming. However, utilizing energy-efficient appliances and retrofitting the house to 6.5 stars or higher level are substantial measures to maintain the level same as or less than the current level of overall energy consumption and GHG emissions. Climate adaptions that focus on improving the energy-efficiency of building envelop, applying renewable energy and switching to facilities with low GHG emissions are desirable solutions.

China Building Energy Consumption: Definitions and Measures from an Operational Perspective

China building energy consumption (BEC) has been gradually derived and also sparked attention. However, something worth discussing is estimating the BEC based on the definition of life cycle or building operation. In addition, there exists discrepancy in the previous studies and the real status of BEC has not been known well. In order to settle the disputes over the calculation of BEC, this paper establishes an appropriate accounting method of building energy to present the BEC situation in China and lays the foundation for policymakers to develop appropriate energy saving policies. Meanwhile, this study attempts to clarify the BEC to help policymakers assess the effect of environmental policies. Using the method in this document, we find that the energy consumption of buildings just accounts for 15%–16% of the final total energy consumption in China; by contrast, the previous studies usually have double accounting through a top-down approach if central heat supply of buildings was taken into additional consideration.

Status and decomposition analysis on building energy consumption of China in the last decade

As the need for international climate change negotiation and national sustainable development increases, China has announced its energy conservation and emission reduction target, in which building energy consumption is an important part. The energy consumption and total energy consumption of classified buildings in China during 2004–2013 are calculated, taking into consideration the characteristics of China's building sector. The LMDI (Logarithmic Mean Divisia Index) method is adopted to carry out the factor decomposition research and discussion of the four factors influencing the energy consumption (comprising different building types of GFA (gross floor area) per capita, the energy consumption per unit GFA, the urban population proportion, and the total population) of China's building sector. The results show that the continuous increase of GFA per capita is the primary factor influencing the increase in China's building energy consumption and the increase of urbanization ratio is the secondary factor. Meanwhile, controlling building energy consumption per unit GFA is the effective way to decrease the total energy consumption. The core method of controlling the energy consumption demands of China's building sector in the future is to reasonably control the future GFA per capita and to simultaneously take corresponding measures to reduce the building energy consumption per unit GFA.