Energy Efficient Buildings

Decarbonization Avenue : Energy Efficient Buildings


Buildings consume almost 40% of all electricity. That is a cause for concern as well as an opportunity to leverage.

What if we are able to bring in significant efficiencies to the way buildings use energy and are able to bring down their energy use significantly without sacrificing comfort? That could result in significant CO2 emissions reduction.

Typically, HVAC constitutes about 40% of a building’s total energy consumption, with 10% from lighting, and about 20% from appliances and equipment such as water heaters, freezers, cloth washers & dryers etc. Such a consumption profile helps solution providers to target key segments such as HVAC for effective savings on energy consumption and high return on investments for the owners of the building.

Some energy efficiency solutions such as efficient air conditioners are fairly well developed, while some others such as the use of digital technologies for monitoring and controlling energy use have evolved quite rapidly during the last few years. A few others, especially energy efficient building heating solutions, are seeing significant innovations especially in countries such as the UK and others in Europe with substantial space heating requirements.

Apart from its decarbonization potential, building energy efficiency measures also provide attractive returns on investment for the building owners, creating a win-win for all stakeholders.

Solution-specific challenges exist - radiant cooling solutions, for instance, might need significant changes to the building infrastructure. Challenges also exist in terms of level of awareness of some effective solutions and the high upfront costs

Innovations during the 2020-2030 period are likely to happen around the use of IoT for monitoring and control, use of AI/Big Data for building customized applications, material and equipment innovations in thermal storage.

Decarbonization potential

Buildings consume almost 40% of all electricity. As global electricity generation emits about 35% of total CO2 emissions, or about 12 billion tons, energy use for buildings alone emits close to about 5 billion tons of CO2 annually.

Just a 10% reduction in building energy consumption owing to increased efficiency, can save about 500 million tons of CO2 emissions per year. Need we say more for the decarbonization potential of building energy efficiency?

Industries impacted

  • Business support services
  • Internet & online solutions
  • Computers & software
  • Construction & real estate
  • Electrical
  • Electronics & semiconductors
  • Power

Latest News on Energy Efficient Buildings


Themes & Topics

  • Energy efficiency for commercial & industrial buildings

  • Energy efficiency for residential buildings

  • Energy efficiency for public & government buildings

  • HVAC efficiency

    • Heating efficiency

    • Ventilation

    • Cooling & AC

      • Energy efficient air conditioners

        • Efficient air conditioner components - air handling unit, fan coil unit, compressors, condensers

        • Sustainable refrigerants

        • Energy Star rating

        • Better thermostats

      • Energy efficient chillers

      • Monitoring, analytics & control for cooling and air conditioning (BMS, sensors…)

      • Better insulation to reduce cooling requirements

      • Passive cooling to reduce external cooling requirements

      • Better building materials for reducing cooling energy needs

      • Waste heat recovery from air conditioning and cooling systems

      • Radiant cooling

      • Geothermal cooling

      • Solar air conditioning

  • Lighting

    • Effective building envelope design

    • Building lighting efficiency

  • Design for building energy efficiency

    • Performance based building design

    • Passive house design

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  • Energy efficiency of various building components

    • Better insulation

    • Materials for building energy efficiency

      • Roofing materials

      • Smart glass

    • Efficiency enhancement through glass & windows

    • Efficiency enhancement through floors, ceiling & roofs

    • Efficiency enhancement through doors

    • Energy efficiency through “plugging leaks”

  • Use of IT & digital solutions

    • IoT

    • AI

    • Sensors

    • BMS

  • Practices

    • Passive energy utilization for buildings

    • Energy audits for building energy efficiency

    • Effective building maintenance practices

    • Building energy efficiency codes & standards

    • Retrofits for energy efficiency

  • Water use in buildings

  • Financing energy efficiency in buildings

  • Policies and regulations for building energy efficiency

  • Business models to enhance building energy efficiency

  • Training/capacity building

    • Building maintenance