Greening Existing Buildings [GEB] Strategies
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A Service of Leibniz-Informationszentrum econstor Wirtschaft Leibniz Information Centre Make Your Publications Visible. zbw for Economics Leung, Ben Chak-Man Article Greening existing buildings [GEB] strategies Energy Reports Provided in Cooperation with: Elsevier Suggested Citation: Leung, Ben Chak-Man (2018) : Greening existing buildings [GEB] strategies, Energy Reports, ISSN 2352-4847, Elsevier, Amsterdam, Vol. 4, pp. 159-206, http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.egyr.2018.01.003 This Version is available at: http://hdl.handle.net/10419/187904 Standard-Nutzungsbedingungen: Terms of use: Die Dokumente auf EconStor dürfen zu eigenen wissenschaftlichen Documents in EconStor may be saved and copied for your Zwecken und zum Privatgebrauch gespeichert und kopiert werden. personal and scholarly purposes. 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One of the effective measures to combat Received 30 July 2017 this global warming is to limit/conserve the energy uses globally. It is a common scientific consensus that Received in revised form 1 December 2017 around 30% in average of the total energy uses in modern countries comes from the energy uses from the Accepted 18 January 2018 existing building blocks. This article gives a systematic manner to develop strategies of how to effectively greening the existing buildings [GEB]. The findings concluded that using the above GEB strategies can achieve a total of energy Keywords: Greening existing buildings strategies savings in a range of 40%–60%. This high energy savings will contribute to carbon intensity reduction in Green Audit Award the range of 20%–30%. LEED-EB A Green Audit Award [GAA] is postulated to help to identify the green potential/deficiencies of the Building energy index existing buildings with the aim to wrap up a green improvement plan so that the existing buildings can become green within the constraints of the existing building under the assessment. A pilot test in terms of a case study confirmed that the GAA assessment scheme coupled with the GEB strategies is feasible and cost effective to turn the existing building green. Government support and promotion is crucial for the sustainability of these GEB strategies and a survey from previous study of cost coming from the illness and the pay to avoid this illness points out that the proposed funds to be subsidized for both greening and maintenance of existing buildings with age ≥ 40 years is justifiable for GEB promotion. With the advance of GEB strategies focusing on the rate of return for energy savings, GAA assessment will be an effectual tool to attain the objective of this paper to transform the existing buildings to green with ease and cost effectively, and with the effort of each existing building in adopting the above GEB strategies, an enormous effect will be anticipated in combating the global warming in return. ' 2018 The Author. Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/). 1. Introduction Measures to combat this global warming has raised global grave concern and a Paris Climate Agreement to limit the tem- The vast use of electricity and burning of natural fuels like coal perature rise to 2◦ C has finally taken effective on 4 November has made the Earth's average temperature rising to as much as 2016 (Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 2016) (though the present 1 ◦C over the last century. Recent research also predicts that the US President Donald Trump has announced on 1 June 2017 to ◦ average global temperature may raise as high as 6 C by the year withdraw from this Agreement claiming to renegotiate for better of 2100 (Braford, 2013). This temperature rises effect is drastic. terms for America). If all the ice at the poles and tops pf mountains melt, the sea One of the prime measures to achieve the reduction of global level will rise to 30–50 m inundating most of the countries of the warming is to limit/conserve the energy uses globally. Research earth. The temperature rises will also increase the frequency of shows that the building in existence consumes around 30% of the adverse/severe storms and climatic changes. accumulated energy uses in modern countries and may induce almost 30% of carbon emissions due to energy use (Eurostat, 2009). E-mail address: [email protected]. For example, in US/UK/EU, existing buildings consume in average https://doi.org/10.1016/j.egyr.2018.01.003 2352-4847/' 2018 The Author. Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/). 160 B.C.-M. Leung / Energy Reports 4 (2018) 159–206 of almost 40% of accumulated energy use 30%–40% in the east Asia 4. Demonstrate how the GAA is worked. A pilot test in terms (Pe¯ez-Lombard et al., 2008; U.S. Green Building Council, 2007; of a case study will be used to actually assess the subject The Energy Conservation Center, 2008). Energy consumption by existing building together with a green improvement plan existing buildings in some modern countries like EU and US has proposed by the Green Pro after the assessment even exceeded those in the industrial and transportation sectors. 5. Reassess/recertify the subject existing building using the Thus, turning the existing buildings green can significantly help in same GAA assuming the application of the green improve- limiting/conserving the energy uses and greenhouse gas emissions ment plan has been done. This will evaluate how effective globally. is the green improvement plan has been achieved to the Thus, the objective of this paper in greening the existing build- subject existing building. ings [GEB] with energy reduction can be undoubtedly considered as an effective and sustainable tool to combat both the temper- The GAA assessment and its green improvement plan that follows ature rises and its climatic changes effect in the future. With the is unique and applicable to this subject existing building only development of the GEB strategies focusing in the reduction of and may not be applicable to another existing building. We need the operational energy uses like HVAC, lighting, electrical equip- to assess again for another building by the same GAA developed ment/appliances which are contributing to as much as 80% of under this paper in order to arrive another green improvement the total building energy consumption (Ihm et al., 2009), it is plan to this existing building. Many references of GEB strategies/ believed that the energy uses in the existing buildings can be green improvement plans has been made particularly drawing largely reduced/conserved to make the existing buildings green from the well-developed countries' experience like those in US in (Lowe, 2000; Hastings, 2004) and more livable (Ernst et al., 2010; order to ensure that the GEB strategies/green improvement plan Sweatman et al., 2010). in wake of a GAA assessment to a subject existing building is more The existing green rating system like LEED [EB] (Leadership in pragmatically technical viable, value added, and appealing to the Energy and Environmental Design for Existing Buildings) mainly end-users or stake-holders to all other countries alike. used in USA and Canada, BREEAM (Building Research Establish- The integration of GEB strategies with the GAA assessment ment Environmental Assessment Methods) in UK and GREEN STAR and certification under a recognized Green-Pro will strengthen in Australia and New Zealand are all have common global coverage the strategies by providing a method that optimize the energy but mainly they are focusing on the design perspective with green savings/performance of the subject existing building and achieve standards laid down for the retrofit of the existing buildings. The a green building status, making the existing buildings, and so novelty of this study is to build up a unique green audit tool called future cities, more green. The LEED-EB basis for the GAA has been the Green Audit Award [GAA] scheme to assess the buildings in designed by leading experts in the building industry and has been existence aiming to evaluate the buildings' green potentials with tested (though on a design perspective) to improve the existing implementation measures to turn the existing buildings green buildings to be economically viable, environmentally sustainable in a cost effective manner.