The motivation for the research described in this thesis is the imperative to minimise energy consumption of buildings in the urban environment. A comprehensive approach to analysing energy usage involves the whole life cycle of buildings and infrastructure including embodied energy consumption. Embodied energy represents all of the energy consumed in the production of building materials and components, as well as the energy used to assemble them into the built form. This thesis describes the development and application of a model which spatially depicts embodied energy as a basis for undertaking more holistic analyses of urban energy consumption. The need for comprehensive analyses of energy consumption is initially explored. Such analyses would enable more favourable energy outcomes to be achieved when making decisions about urban planning and development. Research on the value of representing energy usage in a spatial format is reviewed and the case is made for modelling the embodied energy as a contribution to the broader understanding of urban energy consumption. This thesis concentrates on residential areas of the urban environment. The model for spatially representing the embodied energy consumption of residential areas has three components which are embodied energy theory, property register data and geographical information software. A methodology is described which commences with hybrid embodied energy coefficients, integrates these with property register data for a metropolitan area and displays the results using GIS techniques in the form of maps. The model is general but developed using information pertaining to the Adelaide metropolitan area and tested using data from both Adelaide and Sydney. To show that the model can usefully contribute to life cycle energy analyses in the urban environment, it is applied to three case studies involving current urban planning issues involving the densification of dwellings in cities and the redevelopment of older residential areas. These show that such analyses can represent embodied energy spatially and with sufficient accuracy to inform urban planning and development decisions aimed at reducing overall energy usage. In summary, the research has extended knowledge on the embodied energy of the built form by focusing on residential areas which include urban infrastructure rather than just individual buildings. It has provided new insights into the significance of embodied energy of the existing built form by considering it as a ‘sunk cost’ which may be partially recovered and form part of the energy flows in the urban environment. The mapping of embodied energy of the existing built form also offers the potential for quantifying resources which can be re-used to modify total energy consumption of new developments. / http://proxy.library.adelaide.edu.au/login?url= http://library.adelaide.edu.au/cgi-bin/Pwebrecon.cgi?BBID=1311795 / Thesis(Ph.D.) -- University of Adelaide, School of Architecture, Landscape Architecture and Urban Design, 2008

<p>Miljö och energianvändning blir ett mer aktuellt ämne. 40 % av landets totala energianvändning går idag till bostäder.[1] Om elpriserna stiger under den närmsta tiden kommer det med stor säkerhet leda till att människor blir mer kostnadsmedvetna och gärna hittar sätt för att minska sina energikostnader. Som ett led i detta har hustillverkare tagit fram ett energisnålt alternativ till det vanliga huset. Det benämns lågenergihus och använder mindre energi än de hus som är vanliga på marknaden idag. Det här är möjligt genom att lågenergihus byggs på ett annorlunda vis jämfört med ett ordinärt hus. Bland annat används mer isolering och bättre fönster och dörrar. Dessutom är täthet ett viktigt begrepp för att minska värmeförlusterna. Rapporten syftar till att redogöra för vad som karaktäriserar lågenergihus och ge vägledning vid byggande av dessa. Vidare ska rapporten ge svar på frågorna, vilka är problemen och vilka är fördelarna med lågenergihus? Hur ser byggprocessen ut och vad är viktigt att tänka på i de olika skedena i processen? samt, är det ekonomiskt rimligt att bygga lågenergihus? För att få svar på dessa frågor har jag använt mig av litteratur, intervjuer samt informationssökning på nätet, dessutom har jag använt mig av de kunskaper som införskaffats under studietiden. I rapporten har jag valt att endast behandla energianvändning då miljöfrågan är alltför omfattande. Vidare ger rapporten en introduktion till vad som är utmärkande för lågenergihus rent byggnadstekniskt och lotsar läsaren genom byggprocessens olika skeden samt vilka aktörer som är inblandade och vilka deras respektive ansvarsområden är. Dessutom pekar rapporten ut vad som är viktigt för dig som byggherre att tänka på under de olika skedena i byggprocessen i form av planering, utformning, konstruktion, installationer, utgifter, försäkringar, kontroller och avtal, vare sig du väljer att uppföra byggnaden i egen regi eller anlita en entreprenör.</p><p>Rapporten ger exempel på lösningar gällande konstruktion, installationer och värmesystem som är lämpliga i ett lågenergihus. Dessutom görs en energiberäkning på ett lågenergihus ritat av författaren till rapporten. Beräkningen ger huset en energianvändning på 56 kWh/m², år, vilket är ca hälften av vad lagar och föreskrifter anger som maximalt värde ett hus får ha. Idéer och tankar som legat till grund för huset beskrivs. Då detta hus ritats har även andra idéer implementerats som inte är specifika för lågenergihus, utan syftar till att huset ska ha en beredskap vid tillexempel elavbrott. I slutet av rapporten ges även tips på hur du som husägare ytterligare kan spara energi och bidra till en hållbar utveckling.</p><p>[1]Gross, Holger (2008). <em>Energismarta småhus: vägledning och råd till byggherrar, arkitekter och ingenjörer</em>. Stockholm: Gross produktion i samarbete med Villaägarnas riksförbund</p><p> </p> / <p>The environment and the use of energy is becoming a more present subject. Today the real estate industry accounts for more than 40% of Sweden’s total energy consumption.[1]As energy prices rise, energy-saving in buildings is becoming increasingly important to homeowners. As result of this, house manufacturers have created a new type of energy-saving house called low-energy house. This house has a different construction in comparison to an ordinary house. The theses aims to give guidance when building a low-energy house and answer the following questions, what are the problems and what are the benefits, which are the different phases of the building process, what issues are important to consider in these phases and is it economically realistic to build a low-energy house. To be able to answer these questions I have collected material from litterateur, interviews, and web searching. In addition I also have used the knowledge I have obtained during my period of studies. The thesis only concern the energy consumption as the environmental part of it is too substantial. In addition the thesis gives a presentation of the building process, who are involved and what are their field of responsibility. Furthermore it points out what you as a future owner of a house/building proprietor should be attentive to during the building process so that no mistakes are made that causes the end results not turning out as expected. Different laws, rules, contracts, norms and authorities that occurs in the building process,  are accounted for and explained in the thesis in such a way that is easy to grasp for those not familiar to the subject.</p><p> </p><p>The report gives advice and example of solutions in terms of construction and installations e.g. heating distribution system that are appropriate in a low-energy house.</p><p>The thesis includes a calculation of the energy use of a low-energy house, which shows that the house uses about 56 kWh/m², year. In comparison, this is about half the maximum limit decided by the Swedish constitution BBR.</p><p> </p><p> A suggestion for a low-energy house is displayed in the paper, it is the same housed used for the calculation of energy use. Ideas and thoughts regarding the house are described. This suggestion also implements a few ideas’ that perhaps contributes additionally to energy-savings and a sustainable environment.</p><h2><em> </em></h2><p>[1] Gross, Holger (2008). <em>Energismarta småhus: vägledning och råd till byggherrar, arkitekter och ingenjörer</em>. Stockholm: Gross produktion i samarbete med Villaägarnas riksförbund</p>

With the rapid increase of the world energy demand and consumption, the method and techniques to analyze, improve and optimize energy conversion systems have to deal not only with direct fuel exergy (energy) consumption, but also with other resources, which have associated exergy consumptions, and with environmental impacts, such as global warming. A general method for energy conversion system analysis is presented in this thesis. This method uses exergy as a measure to compare and analyze the natural resource consumption (both fuels and materials) and the global warming impact of different energy conversion systems for their life-time. The method, which adds the fuel production exergy and material exergy into consideration, allows more complete exergy analyses to be conducted. The global warming impact due to the chemical emissions and impact associated with direct exergy consumption (fuel consumption) as well as system equipment materials consumption of the energy conversion system are considered together in this thesis. Based on the concept of exergy, the Total Equivalent Resource Exergy (TERE), which includes both direct resource exergy consumption and resource exergy needed to recover the total equivalent global warming gases of the energy conversion system, is proposed in this thesis. TERE uses exergy as a criterion to compare the energy conversion systems and providing information of how effective a system is regarding the use of natural resources. The calculation of TERE values for the selected energy conversion systems indicates that the resource exergy and the environmental impact exergy are both substantial impacts and should be compared together. This concept of TERE can be used as the objective function for energy system design and optimization. / Graduation date: 1996

No description available.

Syfte: Syftet med uppsatsen är att undersöka hur energideklarationen har tagits emot och påverkat fastighetsägares arbete med energifrågor i flerbostadshus i Gävle. Metod: Denna uppsats baseras på kvalitativa intervjuer med fastighetsägare i Gävle. Fastighetsägarna som har medverkat är från den kommunala och privata hyressektorn samt kooperativa bostadsrättsorganisationer och privata bostadsrättsföreningar. Intervjumaterialet har sammanställts i fem olika kategorier i löpande text med förtydligande tabeller och diagram. Resultat och slutsats: Endast tre av de sju tillfrågade fastighetsägarna är helt färdiga med energideklarationerna. Alla respondenter anser att energideklarationen är bra över lag, men det finns även flera saker som de anser är negativt med energideklarationen. Majoriteten av respondenterna anser att de inte har gjort några större förändringar i och med den nya lagen, de jobbade redan med energibesparande åtgärder innan energideklarationerna genomfördes. Förslag till fortsatt forskning: I uppsatsen har vi inte tagit hänsyn till de boende och deras påverkan av energiförbrukningen. Intressant vore att undersöka hur fastighetsägarna kan påverka deras energiförbrukning och hur medvetna de boende är om sina vanor. Uppsatsens bidrag: Uppsatsen har gett en inblick i hur energideklarationen fungerar i verkligheten och hur den har tagits emot av fastighetsägare i Gävle. Vidare har uppsatsen bidragit till en överblick över vad de olika fastighetsägarna fokuserar på när det gäller energifrågor. Nyckelord: Energideklaration, energiförbrukning / Aim: The aim of this paper is to investigate how the Energy Performance Certificate have been received and have affected building owner’s work with energy related issues in residential buildings in Gävle.   Method: This paper is based on qualitative interviews with building owners in Gävle. The property owners who have contributed are from the municipal and private rental sector, co-operative economic associations and private housing cooperatives. The interview material has been put together in five different categories with clarifying tables and diagrams.   Result and conclusions: Only three out of seven building owners have completed the Energy Performance Certificates (EPC). All respondents generally think that the EPC is good, but there are several things that they consider negative about the EPC. The majority of the respondents think that they have not made any major changes with the new legislation; they already worked with energy-saving measures before the EPC was carried out.   Suggestions for future research: In the paper we have not considered the tenants and their influence on the energy consumption. It would be interesting to research how the building owners can affect their energy consumption and how aware they are of their habits.   Contribution of the thesis: The paper gives an insight in how the EPC works in reality and how it has been received by building owners in Gävle. Furthermore, the paper have contributed to a general view of what the building owners focus on when it comes to energy relates issues.   Key words: Energy Performance Certificate, Energy consumption

The thesis project explores the use of an optimization methodology for selecting the lowest monetary cost combinations of technologies to meet a set operational energy efficiency targets for buildings. The optimization approach, which is operated on a normative energy model, is compared with existing prescriptive methodologies for selecting technology combinations and a metric is developed for ranking their effectiveness; the E/C Ratio. The energy savings/ cost ratio is also the objective function that the optimization algorithm is set to maximize. The optimization routine is coded in to a custom MATLAB script and is used in two case studies to optimize a proto-typical Korean apartment and office building. The optimization methodology finds technology combinations that are much more cost effective than the prescriptive methodology at meeting an energy savings target and can generically be applied to other buildings given a palette of technology alternatives and the corresponding cost data.

Hospital is of interest when consider its especial function. Because of the obviously different between the normal residential buildings, the requirement of hospitals’ indoor climate strictly differs from other buildings. The author starts this report by briefly stating the building construction currently. Surrounded the topic of thermal comfort and energy consumption, many suggestion and options came out in this report to develop a better condition. Firstly, the introduction of the hospital buildings requires the background of the hospital object and the purpose to this report will be stated. Secondly, the simulation tool and how to use this tool simulate our real case are introduced. Then, the summer case is investigated by this tool after the model is proved to be validated. Finally, the improvement of establishing a better indoor environment is raised and the results of improvement and conclusion can be found. The final result will show the optimal solution that discovered by this study after compared different alternatives carefully.

In each country, the concept of housing exists in relationship between the ways people live, the local climate, the social and political factors that affect the evolution of architecture and the actual structure of the house. The economic developments of the countries and the political situations and regulations have all affected the rise of the residential market. In Greece, where the majority of the residential buildings were constructed between 1960 and 1990, residential buildings represent an important sector in the energy consumption and economic growth of the country. Global warming and changes in the climate system has an important impact in building stock. The European Union is concerned about the scale of the consequences and has encouraged energy efficiency in buildings by mandating the Energy Performance Building Directive for all European countries [1]. In my opinion, it is the responsibility of the architect to address the impact of existing residential buildings by retrofitting solutions with the aim of reducing the energy consumption and eventually improving the quality of life. Architects, in collaboration with energy experts, can work properly to provide effective solutions. With the guidance of the new directive, along with their personal knowledge and experience in energy efficiency they can help bring about increased energy building performance. In order to demonstrate how architects can implement such an energy retrofit plan, this thesis presents a short description of residential buildings constructed between 60's - 80'by presenting a typical building representing the current state of the Greek building stock, and by studying its energy consumption. An energy performance simulation of the building with different energy simulation software considers different scenarios and describes a way to reduce energy demand and increase comfort in these buildings. The primary software tools used in the study was TEE KENAK, developed by the Greek chamber in accordance with the European energy rating tools for the implementation of the Energy Performance Building Directive. Additional software tools, including ECOtect, and the "Energy Performance Calculator", developed by the department of High Performance Buildings at the Georgia Institute of Technology in order to verify the information provided by the actual energy bills and the TEE KENAK. The results presented in this study estimate the building retrofit and energy saving, making appropriate decisions in terms of energy conservation and improvement in the existing residential building considering energy cost savings, payback from retrofit investments, along with architectural design considerations.

Energy input is vital in every swine operation as it directly affects production performance and overall profitability. With the increasing trend in energy prices and feed costs, the swine industry needed to find ways to improve energy use efficiency in their operations in order to reduce overall cost of production. The goals of this study were to gather benchmark information on current energy usage in swine barns through survey and energy audit, and evaluate different energy-saving measures through building simulation.<p> The results of the survey showed that the average electricity and gas cost was $6.50/head for farrow-to-finish barns, $1.70/head for grow-finish barns, $0.59/head for nursery and $1.95/head for farrow-wean barns. Significant difference (P<0.05) in energy usage within the same type of operation was observed, implying significant opportunities to improve energy use practices in some barns to reduce overall energy costs.<p> The results of the barn monitoring showed that the average daily electricity consumption during summer for farrowing, nursery, grow-finish and gestation room was 3.79 kWh/head (16 sows); 0.12 kWh/head (226 pigs); 0.14 kWh/head (551 pigs) and 0.33 kWh/head (349 sows); respectively. During winter, the average daily electricity consumption for farrowing, nursery, grow-finish and gestation room was 3.92 kWh/head (15 sows); 0.14 kWh/head (227 pigs); 0.09 kWh/head (521 pigs) and 0.22 kWh/head (322 sows); respectively. Highly negative correlation (range from -0.6 to -0.9) was observed between the fan energy consumption and gas concentration of H2S, NH3 and CO2 during summer. This implied that reducing ventilation rate was not a sound option to reduce energy consumption.<p> A simulation model was developed using the principle of heat transfer and thermodynamics to evaluate various energy-conservation measures through building simulation. Applying energy conservation strategies to lighting, creep heating, recirculation fans, exhaust fans, feed motor and heat recovery, an average annual savings of 25,957 kWh (43 kWh/sow); 47,391 kWh (79 kWh/sow); 9,872 kWh (16 kWh/sow); 118,890 kWh (198 kWh/sow); 1,846 kWh (3 kWh/sow); and 74,952 m3 (125 m3/sow) can be achieved, respectively. The outcome of this research project will help pork producers in managing the use of energy in their operations more efficiently, thereby reducing overall energy costs. Additionally, the reduction of energy use across the industry would contribute to the reduction in greenhouse gas emissions associated with energy generation.

Commercial building owners spent $167 billion for energy in 2006. Building commissioning services have proven to be successful in saving building energy consumption. However, the optimal energy performance obtained by commissioning may subsequently degrade. The persistence of savings is of significant interest. For commissioning persistence, two statistical approaches, Days Exceeding Threshold-Date (DET-Date) method and Days Exceeding Threshold-Outside Air Temperature (DET-Toa) method, are developed to detect abnormal whole building energy consumption, and two approaches called Cosine Similarity method and Euclidean Distance Similarity method are developed to isolate the possible fault reasons. The effectiveness of these approaches is demonstrated and compared through tests in simulation and real buildings. The impacts of the factors including calibrated simulation model accuracy, fault severity, the time of fault occurrence, reference control change magnitude setting, and fault period length are addressed in the sensitivity study. The study shows that the DET-Toa method and the Cosine Similarity method are superior and more useful for the whole building fault detection and diagnosis.