IEA EBC Annex 56 – Cost Effective Energy and Carbon Emission Optimization in Building Renovation

Starting point and motivation


A significant reduction of the greenhouse gas emissions is necessary to slow or stop the climate change. The increase of the energy-efficiency of the buildings is a common implemented option but not the only determining criteria. The challenge to renovate our existing building stock is higher than to build new energy efficient buildings. Furthermore all building and quality standards have been developed for new buildings. Target and limit values, which meet the complexity of renovations, are missing. Therefore the building and quality standards for new buildings are applied to renovated buildings without any adaptions. From an economic point of view it will be very difficult, if not impossible, to renovate the total existing building stock to a high energy efficient level according to those quality standards for new buildings.

Contents and goals

To increase the renovation rate of the existing building stock and to reduce the greenhouse gas emissions of the building sector, solutions for cost efficient renovations are required. For that reason the objective of the IEA EBC Annex 56 is to develop a methodology for cost effective energy and carbon emissions optimization in building renovation. Within the frame of the Annex 56 not only this methodology should be developed, furthermore also the right balance between energy efficient measures and the renewable energy use should be found. The developed methodology provides the basis for the assessment and evaluation of energy related renovation options. A comprehensive analysis of the different renovation options is necessary to find the appropriate measures for each individual building. Energetic, ecological and economic criteria are part of this comprehensive analysis, including also co-benefits as overall added values. The goal is to develop cost effective energy and carbon emissions optimizations in building renovations with the help of Life Cycle Cost (LCC) Assessments, Life Cycle Impact Assessments (LCIA) and with the identification of co-benefits as an added value to the energy and carbon emissions reduction.

Results up to now

Brochure „Shining Examples“

One of the outcomes of the project is the publishing of a brochure, which compiles a set of shining examples identified by the partners. The current version of the brochure can be downloaded here.

During the development of the project, improvements will occur to this document

Methodology for the assessment and optimization of costs, energy use and carbon emissions for building renovation

The described methodology provides the basis for the assessment of energy related renovation measures for existing residential buildings and includes the three main impact categories: costs, primary energy demand and carbon emissions.

The report can be downloaded here.

IEA EBC Annex 56 newsletter

Further information, developments and results of the project can be found in the official Annex 56 newsletter which can be downloaded here. You are invited to subscribe to the newsletter directly. More information to the subscription can be found on the IEA EBC Annex 56 homepage. See http://www.iea-annex56.org/

Project management IEA cooperation:
Operating Agent:
Manuela Almeida, University of Minho (Portugal)
Subtask Lead:
Walter Ott, econcept AG (Switzerland)
Piercarlo Romagnoni, IUAV University of Venice (Italien)
Karl Höfler, AEE INTEC (Austria)
Nuno Baptista, ADENE (Portugal)

Partners IEA Cooperation:
Czech Republic
Brno University of Technology
Denmark
Cenergia Energy Consultants
Danish Building Research Institute
Danish Technological Institute
Finland
VTT – Technical Research Center of Finland
Italy
IUAV – University of Venice
The Netherlands
TNO – Netherlands Organization for Applied Scientific Research
Norway
Oslo and Akershus University College of Applied Sciences
Statsbygg
Portugal
University of Minho – Civil Engineering Department
ADENE – Portuguese National Energy Agency
Modular Lda
Spain
University of Basque Country
University of Navarra
CYPE Ingenieros, S.A.
Sweden
Lund University
Switzerland
econcept AG, Zürich
HES-SO – University of Applied Sciences Western Switzerland
Tschechische Republik
Technische Universität Brünn