Abstract
Currently, the building sector has an oversized carbon footprint as it represent the single largest contributor to global greenhouse gas emissions (GHG), with approximately one third of global energy end use taking place within buildings. The challenge to successfully reduce the energy consumption in the building sector is to find effective strategies for retrofitting existing buildings. Significant emissions reductions are possible from applying low carbon retrofit intervention options to existing buildings. The choice of low carbon retrofit intervention options involves evaluation of applicability, energy end uses, environmental impact and cost of application versus energy savings. To develop energy efficiency strategies for building stock, there is the need for optimised methodologies and decision aid tools to evaluate whole-life economic and net environmental gain of the options. This paper describes the development of an integrated framework for a Decision Support System (DSS) based on the optimal ranking and sequencing of retrofit options for emissions reduction in non-domestic buildings. The DSS framework integrates economic (cost) and net environmental (embodied and operational emissions) cost or benefit parameters and an optimization scheme to produce an output based on ranking principles such as marginal abatement cost curve (MACC). The methodology developed can be used to identify and communicate trade-offs between various refurbishment options to aid decisions that are informed both by environmental and financial considerations.
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Ibn-Mohammed, T., Greenough, R., Taylor, S., Ozawa-Meida, L., Acquaye, A. (2013). A Decision Support Framework for Evaluation of Environmentally and Economically Optimal Retrofit of Non-domestic Buildings. In: Hakansson, A., Höjer, M., Howlett, R., Jain, L. (eds) Sustainability in Energy and Buildings. Smart Innovation, Systems and Technologies, vol 22. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-36645-1_20
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-36645-1_20
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