Using Real Building Energy Use Data to Explain the Energy Performance Gap of Energy-Efficient Residential Buildings: A Case Study from the Hot Summer and Cold Winter Zone in China

The International Energy Agency (IEA) emphasizes that using real building energy use data (RBEUD) to reflect the actual condition of buildings and inform policy-making is the most effective way to reduce buildings’ carbon emissions. However, based on IEA’s evaluation, regional and national building stock data are limited and lacking. Especially...

Improving the Calibration on Building Stock Level method by Comparing Objective Functions and Optimization Algorithms

Many researchers have indicated the energy performance gap (difference between actual and predicted energy used in buildings), not only on an individual building level, but also on a building stock level. For policy makers it is important that predictions are correct on an building stock level to make them a useful tool to predict the effect of...

An Investigation of Occupants' Energy Perceptions in Energy Efficient Retrofitted Residential Buildings: A Review Paper

Buildings are the main sector in energy consumption and CO2 emissions. Retrofitting of existing building has been identified as one of the significant strategies for reducing the impacts of buildings on energy and environment. However, recent studies have shown that low energy buildings mostly do not perform as expected. These differences are...

Towards energy sufficient buildings and thermal comfort in the built environment

In order to ensure the sustainable development of cities, the existing building stock has to be transformed to stay relevant to the changing needs of urban dwellers and to reduce the economic and environmental impacts of cities on the planet. Thus, innovating and developing a strategy that prepares the built environment for 2050 is of...

Challenges in mitigating the energy performance gap in the Dutch office stock: A case study research on sustainable adaptations to the existing stock considering different stakeholders’ perspectives

Currently, clear European and Global climate goals, such as the Paris Agreement and the European Energy Efficiency Directive, are in place to stimulate more efficient use of resources and lower emissions. The built environment can play a significant role in reaching these objectives in the future since it consumes around 40% of the total energy...

Investigating the effect of human behaviour on the energy performance of 3 typical Dutch residential dwellings using sensors and dynamic performance modelling

Buildings don’t use energy: People do. Do highly efficient homes really save energy? Counter-intuitively, dwellings that use less energy have low energy efficiency, and those with higher energy consumption have higher efficiency. Moreover, even accurate building energy simulation for multiple buildings could not predict the actual energy...