In the original publication of the article, the first affiliation “School of Public Administration, Hunan University, Changsha, China” was incorrectly repeated as fourth affiliation. The fourth affiliation should be “Building and Real Estate Dept. Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hong Kong SAR”. The original article has been corrected.

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The rapidly growing aging population is a global phenomenon imposing societal challenges on many cities. ‘Aging-in-place’ as a popular concept accommodates both the elderly desire to age in a familiar environment and adaptive old home modifications for aging. However, this concept has not been explored in-depth systematically in the urban regeneration context. This article explores a form of aging-in-place that is suitable for large and dense residential urban areas using the case of Hong Kong as an example of a laisse-faire fast-growing dense city, with a focus on home modifications. As in many other Asian cities, with a low tax rate and without a pension scheme, the elderly in Hong Kong are concerned more with the basic needs of health care and rely on public housing. Housing affordability is the primary concern. The government is expected to take the lead in aging-in-place in urban regeneration, in particular, to provide necessary home modifications for the elderly who live in public housing with primary health care provisions. A survey of 294 respondents revealed that housing expenditures, housing size, income level, and residential location are indicators of whether home modifications or health care in cities such as Hong Kong can be afforded by the locals, under tight budget constraints@en

Given various hindrances in the macro context, how to efficiently develop age-friendly community policies requires further research. Currently, such kinds of frameworks are lacking. This paper aims to develop a policy framework to minimise cost and resolve conflict of interest between different generations in age-friendly community development. The study adopted a scientometric method to review the theoretical development of age-friendly community studies. Firstly, with a search for the keywords “age-friendly” and “community” on Web of Science, 72 English academic papers were found containing explicit theories. Most of the studies were conducted in the Global North. Then, a mixed analytical method was used to find a suitable theory, “the production of space”, to develop the policy framework. Lastly, a policy framework was developed to overcome barriers to age-friendly community development strategically. Echoing previous studies, this paper proposes a way to counter financial austerity in age-friendly initiative investment and balance the consideration for older and younger populations in urban development. For practice, the policy framework can provide a reference for more efficient age-friendly community policymaking in different regions. For future research, the framework provides a model for more empirical studies considering the social dynamics in age-friendly community development@en

The aging population is one of the demographic changes in the 21st century. World Health Organization defines an age-friendly city as a place that has an “inclusive and accessible urban environment that promotes active aging.” It receives considerable attention in the field of gerontology and contains important aspects of sustainable urban development. Unfortunately, there have not much research that addresses the relationship between aging-friendly and sustainability. There is a need to modify the market mechanism to achieve environmental objectives while striking a balance between social and economic considerations. This paper aims to empirically examine the integrated relationships between the dense urban environment and the social and emotional needs of the elderly in the Hong Kong context. The on-street survey was conducted in eight districts in Hong Kong to collect the opinions about aging-friendly criteria and sustainability indicators. It utilizes principal component analysis and multiple regression technique to unveil the mask of their intrinsic relationship. The empirical results suggest how the aging-friendly factors have impacted the economic, environmental, and social sustainability to a certain extent. Notably, two key findings were revealed from the empirical results. (a) “Outdoor Spaces” is consistently found not to be a planning factor that can enhance three types of sustainability, irrespective of the age groups in Hong Kong; (b) “Community Support and Health Services” is regarded as a significant factor, with the exception of economic sustainability (age group ≤60).

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Purpose: Design teams have difficulties in assessing building carbon emissions at an early stage, as most building energy simulation tools require a detailed input of building design for estimation. The purpose of this paper is to develop a user-friendly regression model to estimate carbon emissions of the preliminary design of office buildings in the subtropics by way of example. Five sets of building design parameters, including building configuration, building envelope, design space conditions, building system configuration and occupant behaviour, are considered in this study. Design/methodology/approach: Both EnergyPlus and Monte Carlo simulation were used to predict carbon emissions for different combinations of the design parameters. A total of 100,000 simulations were conducted to ensure a full range of simulation results. Based on the simulation results, a regression model was developed to estimate carbon emissions of office buildings based on preliminary design information. Findings: The results show that occupant density, annual mean occupancy rate, equipment load, lighting load and chiller coefficient of performance are the top five influential parameters affecting building carbon emissions under the subtropics. Besides, the design parameters of ten office buildings were input into this user-friendly regression model for validation. The results show that the ranking of its simulated carbon emissions for these ten buildings is consistent with the original carbon emissions ranking. Practical implications: With the use of this developed regression model, design teams can not only have a simple and quick estimation of carbon emissions based on the building design information at the conceptual stage but also explore design options by understanding the level of reduction in carbon emissions if a certain building design parameter is changed. The study also provides recommendations on building design to reduce carbon emissions of office buildings. Originality/value: Limited research has been conducted to date to investigate how the change of building design affects carbon emissions in the subtropics where four distinct seasons lead to significant variations of outdoor temperature and relative humidity. Previous research also did not emphasise on the impact of high-rise office building designs (e.g. small building footprint, high window-to-wall ratio) on carbon emissions. This paper adds value by identifying the influential parameters affecting carbon emissions for a high-rise office building design and allows a handy estimate of building carbon emissions under the subtropical conditions. The same approach may be used for other meteorological conditions.

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It is claimed that transaction costs (TCs) affect the effectiveness of any green building (GB) policy. However, few studies have empirically applied TC analysis to GB incentives, which normally should have analyzed the TCs borne by different stakeholders. These include TC typology and determinants during the implementation process, especially the extra administration process where TCs possibly may be incurred. The lack of such in-depth analysis tends to make incentive-design ignore efficiency and fairness amongst the stakeholders. This study aims to improve the efficiency of GB incentives through analyzing TCs borne by the private sector stakeholders. It would identify TC typologies and determinants, and TCs measurement and allocation to different stakeholders. As TCs are policy context-specific, this paper takes a popular GB incentive scheme, Gross Floor Area (GFA) Concession Scheme, as an example. Interviews were conducted with 20 industry experts to validate TCs types and determinants, and to gauge the magnitude of TCs borne by different stakeholders. These empirical evidences are helpful for policy-makers and practitioners to better understand the impacts of TCs, so as to improve the effectiveness of future incentive schemes. In addition, GB policy recommendations for Hong Kong are proposed and many of which are relevant to other countries.

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Hong Kong is becoming an aged city. In a few years, elderly people will account a major portion of its population. Thus, to consider the elderly’s demands in this heterogeneous city calls for research and practices. In this research, the impacts of three demographic factors, which are age, income and education, on age-friendly city planning are explored. A street survey was conducted. The questionnaire inquired the civilians’ perception of importance of age-friendly precincts design criteria in seven dimensions, which are outdoor spaces, transportation, building and neighbourhood, social/civic participation & employment, respect, communication and community & health services. In this paper, the data were analysed using ordinal logistic regression modelling to indicate how each demographic factor contributes to the score of each age-friendly precincts design criterion. These relationships will help policy-makers and developers to estimate the desirability of their age-friendly city facilities and elderly housing in their future planning works.@en

Incentive schemes formed by regulatory or administrative instruments are measures to promote green building (GB) and increase the motivation of developers to meet higher standards. The hidden costs to different stakeholders during the GB transaction are often ignored. Understanding these hidden transaction costs (TCs) helps appraise the costs and benefits of GB and policy effectiveness. The example of a gross floor area (GFA) concession scheme is used systematically to explore and understand the fundamental issues of TCs’ typology and chronology in the GB development process. The GFA
concession scheme is a popular incentive due to its indirect compensation to developers by allowing additional floor area without expenditure by government to implement GBs. A TCs’ framework is used critically to review and evaluate
the costs and benefits of the GFA concession scheme. Its particular implementation in both Hong Kong and Singapore is explored. Hong Kong is used as a case study, complemented with in-depth expert interviews on GFA concession in Hong Kong. The key contribution is to establish the parameters for estimating the optimum GFA bonus that could both motivate various stakeholders and minimize the negative impacts on the built environment in future.@en

Buildings consume a major proportion of the electricity power in most cities, thus promoting building energy efficiency (BEE) will directly contribute to low carbon cities. Some studies suggest that the additional investment on BEE should be well paid off by higher selling prices or more savings in term of life cycle costing. Real estate developers are profit driven and working in a competitive environment. However, it appears that real estate developers are skeptical in entering the BEE market, which requires alternate theories to explain their behaviors. In this study, we attempt incorporating transaction cost economics (TCE) and game theoretical frameworks into the analysis. It suggests that the anticipated transaction costs entailed in the provision of BEE products due to such factors as bounded rationality, opportunism and contractual hazards, combined with the asymmetrical information in the BEE market have curtailed the developers' interests. This study also leads to suggesting some policy recommendations to induce the developers entering into the BEE market by reducing the transaction costs.

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Buildings account for 40% of global energy consumption and nearly one-third of global CO2 emissions; and the resulting carbon footprint significantly exceeds that of all forms of transportation combined. Attractive opportunities exist to reduce buildings' energy use at lower costs and higher returns than in other sectors. This paper analyzes the concerns of uncertainty, in terms of transaction costs, to the real estate developers when they make decisions about investing in Building Energy Efficiency (BEE). To solicit views of developers regarding BEE investment, in-depth interviews were conducted with 15 executives and architects who work in big real estate development firms covering 80% of real estate activities in Hong Kong. This research applies transaction cost economics (TCE) to study the underlying reasons resulting from uncertainty that cause market reluctance to accept BEE by choice. It provides a detailed analysis of the current situation and future prospects for BEE adoption through studying the impacts from three aspects: economic, market and policy uncertainties. It delineates the market and suggests possible policy solutions to overcome the uncertainties and to attain the large-scale deployment of energy-efficient building techniques. The findings establish the groundwork for future studies on how to choose a particular policy package and what roles government should play to solve the existing problems in BEE development.@en

Purpose: Building energy efficiency retrofit (BEER) not only provides excellent opportunities to reduce overall energy consumption of buildings in a city but also encourages environmental protection, the rational use of resources, and occupants' healthcare, which all contribute towards the sustainability of existing buildings. However, there is a lack of effective performance indicators to measure the sustainability of BEER projects. The aim of this paper is to formulate a list of key performance indicators (KPI) for the sustainability assessment of BEER in hotel buildings. Design/methodology/approach: First, a literature review and in-depth interviews with industry experts and academic researchers were conducted, which filtered the performance indicators for assessing sustainability. Second, a questionnaire survey was conducted to collect data from various groups of experts to analyze the significance of the selected performance indicators. Finally, a model based on fuzzy set theory was designed to identify the key performance indicators (KPIs) for the sustainability of BEER. Findings: Eight KPIs were identified based on fuzzy set theory in this study. They are: quality performance, hotel energy management, cost performance, project profitability, energy consumption and resources saving, health and safety, stakeholder satisfaction, and innovation and improvement. Practical implications: The KPIs of sustainability of BEER identified for hotel buildings in China in this study can be useful reference for other similar research. However, with the different requirements for building types and building ownerships, the KPIs of sustainability of BEER for different buildings may be variable. The findings in this study may not be directly relevant to other types of building. Originality/value: Key performance indicators for the sustainability assessment of BEER in hotel buildings in China are identified and analyzed in this study. The KPIs can help decision-makers to identify an optimal solution between alternatives, which presents the maximum sustainability performance.

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Purpose – Future energy consumption in China's building sector will have a considerable influence on both China and the world's energy markets. Although the Chinese government has set out a series of policies to promote building energy efficiency (BEE), the BEE market share remains small. The paper aims to identify the key policy deficiencies that affect such promotion. Design/methodology/approach – Based on the defined roles played by the government, this paper traces the path that China's BEE policies have taken since the 1980s and highlights the key problems. To understand how the Chinese government's BEE policies meet the expectations of market stakeholders, the paper employs data from a questionnaire of building design professionals in the country's major cities to identify the most favourable factors for and existing hurdles to the promotion of the BEE market. Findings – The Chinese government needs to exert greater effort towards overcoming the deficiencies in its roles as policy maker, fiscal hub and advocate. At this stage, China would benefit more from legal and government intervention than from heavy reliance on voluntary schemes for BEE promotion. Practical implications – The paper shows that both the government and industry need to become better informed of the conditions required to attract market parties towards the promotion of BEE. This study also identifies the main concerns involved, thus providing a strong foundation for further study in this arena. Originality/value – This paper highlights the mismatch between market expectations and government policies aimed at BEE promotion in China. It fills the knowledge gap between market stakeholders and government for future policy design concerning BEE promotion.@en