The Impact of Different Insulation Options on the Life Cycle Energy Demands of a Hypothetical Residential Building

An increasing number of studies apply life-cycle assessment methodology to assess the impact of a new building or to prioritize between different building refurbishment strategies. Among the different hypotheses to consider during the application of this methodology, the selection of the impact indicator is critical, as this choice will completely change the interpretation of the results. This article proposes applying four indicators that allow analysing the results of a refurbishment project of a residential building with the life-cycle approach: non-renewable primary energy use reduction (NRPER), net energy ratio (NER), internal rate of return (IRR), and life-cycle payback (LC-PB). The combination of environmental and economic indicators when evaluating the results has allowed to prioritize among the different strategies defined for this case study. Furthermore, an extensive sensitivity assessment reflects the high uncertainty of some of the parameters and their high influence on the final results. To this end, new hypotheses related to the following parameters have been considered: reference service life of the building, estimated service life of material, operational energy use, conversion factor, energy price, and inflation rate. The results show that the NRPE use reduction value could vary up to −44%. The variation of the other indicators is also very relevant, reaching variation rates such as 100% in the NER, 450% in the IRR, and 300% in the LC-PB. Finally, the results allow to define the type of input or hypothesis that influences each indicator the most, which is relevant when calibrating the prioritization process for the refurbishment strategy.

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A Life Cycle Assessment of Two Residential Buildings Using Two Different LCA Database-Software Combinations: Recognizing Uniformities and Inconsistencies

Buildings ◽

10.3390/buildings9010020 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 9 (1) ◽

pp. 20 ◽

Cited By ~ 17

Author(s):

Nargessadat Emami ◽

Jukka Heinonen ◽

Björn Marteinsson ◽

Antti Säynäjoki ◽

Juha-Matti Junnonen ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Life Cycle Assessment ◽

Life Cycle ◽

Environmental Impact ◽

Residential Buildings ◽

Construction Materials ◽

Residential Building ◽

Time Frame ◽

Building Sector ◽

Concrete Element ◽

The Impact

Traditionally, the emissions embodied in construction materials have not been considered important; however, they are becoming crucial due to the short time-frame in which the emissions should be reduced. Moreover, evaluating the environmental burden of construction materials has proven problematic and the reliability of the reported impact estimates is questionable. More reliable information from the construction sector is thus urgently needed to back and guide decision-making. Currently, the building sector environmental impact assessments predominantly employ commercial software with environmental impact databases and report results without knowledge about the impact of the software/database choice on the results. In this study, estimates for the embodied environmental impacts of residential construction from the two most widely used life cycle assessment (LCA) database-software combinations, ecoinvent with SimaPro software and GaBi, are compared to recognize the uniformities and inconsistencies. The impacts caused by two residential buildings of different types, a concrete-element multi-story residential building and a detached wooden house, both located in Finland, were assessed, including all building systems with a high level of detail. Based on the ReCiPe Midpoint method, fifteen impact categories were estimated and compared. The results confirm that the tool choice significantly affects the outcome. For the whole building, the difference is significant, around 15%, even in the most widely assessed category of Climate Change, and yields results that lean in different directions for the two cases. In the others, the estimates are entirely different, 40% or more in the majority of the categories and up to several thousand percentages of difference. The main conclusion is that extensive work is still urgently needed to improve the reliability of LCA tools in the building sector in order to provide reliable and trustworthy information for policy-making.

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Evaluating the Effect of Window-to-Wall Ratios on Cooling-Energy Demand on a Typical Summer Day

International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health ◽

10.3390/ijerph18168411 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 18 (16) ◽

pp. 8411

Author(s):

Jiayu Li ◽

Bohong Zheng ◽

Komi Bernard Bedra ◽

Zhe Li ◽

Xiao Chen

Keyword(s):

Energy Demand ◽

Thermal Environment ◽

Coupled Model ◽

Residential Building ◽

Electricity Demand ◽

Thermal Perception ◽

Energy Demands ◽

Typical Summer ◽

The Impact

The window-to-wall ratio (WWR) significantly affects the indoor thermal environment, causing changes in buildings’ energy demands. This research couples the “Envi-met” model and the “TRNSYS” model to predict the impact of the window-to-wall ratio on indoor cooling energy demands in south Hunan. With the coupled model, “Envi-met + TRNSYS”, fixed meteorological parameters around the exterior walls are replaced by varied data provided by Envi-met. This makes TRNSYS predictions more accurate. Six window-to-wall ratios are considered in this research, and in each scenario, the electricity demand for cooling is predicted using “Envi-met + TRNSYS”. Based on the classification of thermal perception in south Hunan, the TRNSYS predictions of the electricity demand start with 30 °C as the threshold of refrigeration. The analytical results reveal that in a 6-storey residential building with 24 households, in order to maintain the air temperature below 30 °C, the electricity required for cooling buildings with 0% WWR, 20% WWR, 40% WWR, 60% WWR, 80% WWR, and 100% WWR are respectively 0 KW·h, 19.6 KW·h, 133.7 KW·h, 273.1 KW·h, 374.5 KW·h, and 461.9 KW·h. This method considers the influence of microclimate on the exterior wall and improves the accuracy of TRNSYS in predicting the energy demand for indoor cooling.

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Life-Cycle Costs of Selected Uniformed Health Professions (Phase II: The Impact of Constraints and Policies on the Optimal-Mix-of-Accession Model)

10.21236/ada413788 ◽

2003 ◽

Author(s):

Shayne Brannman ◽

Eric W. Christensen ◽

Ronald H. Nickel ◽

Cori Rattelman ◽

Richard D. Miller

Keyword(s):

Life Cycle ◽

Phase Ii ◽

Health Professions ◽

Life Cycle Costs ◽

Optimal Mix ◽

The Impact

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2-Piece Cork Stoppers as Alternative for Valorization of Thin Cork Planks: Analysis by LCA Methodology

Foods ◽

10.3390/foods10040873 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 10 (4) ◽

pp. 873

Author(s):

Francisco Javier Flor-Montalvo ◽

Agustín Sánchez-Toledo Ledesma ◽

Eduardo Martínez Cámara ◽

Emilio Jiménez-Macías ◽

Jorge Luis García-Alcaraz ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Life Cycle Assessment ◽

Life Cycle ◽

Raw Materials ◽

Lca Methodology ◽

Significant Difference ◽

Different Dimensions ◽

The Impact ◽

Different Thickness ◽

Cork Stoppers ◽

Wine Bottle

Natural stoppers are a magnificent closure for the production of aging wines and unique wines, whose application is limited by the availability of raw materials and more specifically of cork sheets of different thickness and quality. The growing demand for quality wine bottle closures leads to the search for alternative stopper production. The two-piece stopper is an alternative since it uses non-usable plates in a conventional way for the production of quality caps. The present study has analyzed the impact of the manufacture of these two-piece stoppers using different methodologies and for different dimensions by developing an LCA (Life Cycle Assessment), concluding that the process phases of the plate, its boiling, and its stabilization, are the phases with the greatest impact. Likewise, it is detected that the impacts in all phases are relatively similar (for one kg of net cork produced), although the volumetric difference between these stoppers represents a significant difference in impacts for each unit produced.

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Case study of a water bioengineering construction site in Austria. Ecological aspects and application of an environmental life cycle assessment model

International Journal of Energy and Environmental Engineering ◽

10.1007/s40095-021-00419-8 ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

M. von der Thannen ◽

S. Hoerbinger ◽

C. Muellebner ◽

H. Biber ◽

H. P. Rauch

Keyword(s):

Global Warming ◽

Life Cycle Assessment ◽

Life Cycle ◽

Energy Demand ◽

Assessment Model ◽

Construction Site ◽

Negative Effects ◽

Environmental Life Cycle Assessment ◽

The Impact ◽

Soil And Water

AbstractRecently, applications of soil and water bioengineering constructions using living plants and supplementary materials have become increasingly popular. Besides technical effects, soil and water bioengineering has the advantage of additionally taking into consideration ecological values and the values of landscape aesthetics. When implementing soil and water bioengineering structures, suitable plants must be selected, and the structures must be given a dimension taking into account potential impact loads. A consideration of energy flows and the potential negative impact of construction in terms of energy and greenhouse gas balance has been neglected until now. The current study closes this gap of knowledge by introducing a method for detecting the possible negative effects of installing soil and water bioengineering measures. For this purpose, an environmental life cycle assessment model has been applied. The impact categories global warming potential and cumulative energy demand are used in this paper to describe the type of impacts which a bioengineering construction site causes. Additionally, the water bioengineering measure is contrasted with a conventional civil engineering structure. The results determine that the bioengineering alternative performs slightly better, in terms of energy demand and global warming potential, than the conventional measure. The most relevant factor is shown to be the impact of the running machines at the water bioengineering construction site. Finally, an integral ecological assessment model for applications of soil and water bioengineering structures should point out the potential negative effects caused during installation and, furthermore, integrate the assessment of potential positive effects due to the development of living plants in the use stage of the structures.

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Evaluation of bioclimatic potential, energy consumption, CO2-emission, and life cycle cost of a residential building located in Sub-Saharan Africa; a case study of eight countries

Solar Energy ◽

10.1016/j.solener.2021.02.052 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 218 ◽

pp. 512-524

Author(s):

Modeste Kameni Nematchoua ◽

Sigrid Reiter

Keyword(s):

Life Cycle ◽

Energy Consumption ◽

Potential Energy ◽

Life Cycle Cost ◽

Co2 Emission ◽

Residential Building ◽

Sub Saharan Africa ◽

Sub Saharan

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Life Cycle Assessment of an Innovative Hybrid Energy Storage System for Residential Buildings in Continental Climates

Applied Sciences ◽

10.3390/app11093820 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 11 (9) ◽

pp. 3820

Author(s):

Noelia Llantoy ◽

Gabriel Zsembinszki ◽

Valeria Palomba ◽

Andrea Frazzica ◽

Mattia Dallapiccola ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Life Cycle Assessment ◽

Life Cycle ◽

Residential Buildings ◽

Storage System ◽

Energy Storage System ◽

Hot Water ◽

Hybrid Energy ◽

Hybrid Energy Storage ◽

Innovative System ◽

The Impact

With the aim of contributing to achieving the decarbonization of the energy sector, the environmental impact of an innovative system to produce heating and domestic hot water for heating demand-dominated climates is assessed is evaluated. The evaluation is conducted using the life cycle assessment (LCA) methodology and the ReCiPe and IPCC GWP indicators for the manufacturing and operation stages, and comparing the system to a reference one. Results show that the innovative system has a lower overall impact than the reference one. Moreover, a parametric study to evaluate the impact of the refrigerant is carried out, showing that the impact of the overall systems is not affected if the amount of refrigerant or the impact of refrigerant is increased.

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Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) of an Innovative Compact Hybrid Electrical-Thermal Storage System for Residential Buildings in Mediterranean Climate

Sustainability ◽

10.3390/su13095322 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 13 (9) ◽

pp. 5322

Author(s):

Gabriel Zsembinszki ◽

Noelia Llantoy ◽

Valeria Palomba ◽

Andrea Frazzica ◽

Mattia Dallapiccola ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Life Cycle Assessment ◽

Life Cycle ◽

Environmental Impact ◽

Mediterranean Climate ◽

Residential Buildings ◽

Renewable Energy Sources ◽

Storage System ◽

Hot Water ◽

Electrical Consumption ◽

The Impact

The buildings sector is one of the least sustainable activities in the world, accounting for around 40% of the total global energy demand. With the aim to reduce the environmental impact of this sector, the use of renewable energy sources coupled with energy storage systems in buildings has been investigated in recent years. Innovative solutions for cooling, heating, and domestic hot water in buildings can contribute to the buildings’ decarbonization by achieving a reduction of building electrical consumption needed to keep comfortable conditions. However, the environmental impact of a new system is not only related to its electrical consumption from the grid, but also to the environmental load produced in the manufacturing and disposal stages of system components. This study investigates the environmental impact of an innovative system proposed for residential buildings in Mediterranean climate through a life cycle assessment. The results show that, due to the complexity of the system, the manufacturing and disposal stages have a high environmental impact, which is not compensated by the reduction of the impact during the operational stage. A parametric study was also performed to investigate the effect of the design of the storage system on the overall system impact.

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Advances of 2nd Life Applications for Lithium Ion Batteries from Electric Vehicles Based on Energy Demand

Sustainability ◽

10.3390/su13105726 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 13 (10) ◽

pp. 5726

Author(s):

Aleksandra Wewer ◽

Pinar Bilge ◽

Franz Dietrich

Keyword(s):

Life Cycle ◽

Lithium Ion Batteries ◽

Electric Vehicles ◽

Energy Demand ◽

Lithium Ion ◽

Life Cycles ◽

Future Research ◽

Research Areas ◽

Study Results ◽

The Impact

Electromobility is a new approach to the reduction of CO2 emissions and the deceleration of global warming. Its environmental impacts are often compared to traditional mobility solutions based on gasoline or diesel engines. The comparison pertains mostly to the single life cycle of a battery. The impact of multiple life cycles remains an important, and yet unanswered, question. The aim of this paper is to demonstrate advances of 2nd life applications for lithium ion batteries from electric vehicles based on their energy demand. Therefore, it highlights the limitations of a conventional life cycle analysis (LCA) and presents a supplementary method of analysis by providing the design and results of a meta study on the environmental impact of lithium ion batteries. The study focuses on energy demand, and investigates its total impact for different cases considering 2nd life applications such as (C1) material recycling, (C2) repurposing and (C3) reuse. Required reprocessing methods such as remanufacturing of batteries lie at the basis of these 2nd life applications. Batteries are used in their 2nd lives for stationary energy storage (C2, repurpose) and electric vehicles (C3, reuse). The study results confirm that both of these 2nd life applications require less energy than the recycling of batteries at the end of their first life and the production of new batteries. The paper concludes by identifying future research areas in order to generate precise forecasts for 2nd life applications and their industrial dissemination.

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