Quantifying Greenhouse Gas Emissions and the Marginal Cost of Carbon Abatement for Residential Buildings under California’s 2019 Title 24 Energy Codes

2019 ◽  
Vol 53 (20) ◽  
pp. 12121-12129 ◽  
Author(s):  
Benjamin W. White ◽  
Debbie Niemeier
2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (17) ◽  
pp. 8086
Author(s):  
Benjamin Govehovitch ◽  
Martin Thebault ◽  
Karine Bouty ◽  
Stéphanie Giroux-Julien ◽  
Éric Peyrol ◽  
...  

The achievement of the targets for reducing greenhouse gas emissions set by the Paris Agreements and the Swiss federal law on the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions (CO2 law) requires massive use of renewable energies, which cannot be achieved without their adoption by the general public. The solar cadaster developed as part of the INTERREG G2 Solar project is intended to assess the solar potential of buildings at the scale of Greater Geneva—for both industrial buildings and for individual residential buildings—at a resolution of 1 m. The new version of the solar cadaster is intended to assess the solar potential of roofs, as well as that of vertical facades. The study presented here aims to validate this new version through a comparison with results obtained with two other simulation tools that are widely used and validated by the scientific community. The good accordance with the results obtained with ENVI-met and DIVA-for-Rhino demonstrates the capability of the radiative model developed for the solar cadaster of Greater Geneva to accurately predict the radiation levels of building facades in configurations with randomly distributed buildings (horizontally or vertically).


Author(s):  
Raluca Andreea Felseghi ◽  
Teodora Melania Şoimoşan ◽  
Constatin Filote ◽  
Maria Simona Răboaca

Currently, buildings are considered to be a continuously evolving organism that over time has to be treated, rehabilitated, and upgraded to meet the requirements set by the user at a certain stage. Buildings are a central element of the EU member states' energy efficiency policies, accounting for about 40% of final energy consumption, and 36% of greenhouse gas emissions, and about 75% of buildings are not energy efficient. Recent applications and studies establish that green retrofitting has maintained older existing buildings to increase energy efficiency, optimize building performance, increase occupants' satisfaction, and boost economic return while decreasing greenhouse gas emissions. In this regard, this chapter aims to address the main factors that negatively affect the performance of residential buildings and presents the common green retrofitting measures that can be taken to ensure the state of human well-being in residential buildings.


2020 ◽  
pp. 1420326X2096216
Author(s):  
Olga Kolodiy ◽  
Guedi Capeluto

Carbon dioxide is the largest component of the human footprint and one of the major components of all greenhouse gases. The expected increase in population will lead to growth in energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions. The building industry has the highest potential for reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Therefore, buildings should become not only efficient consumers but also energy producers, not a simple task in dense cities. The paper describes the feasibility and limitations of near zero energy design in highly dense urban conditions. The study was carried out by examination and comparison of various density design, alternatives of an existing urban plot in the coastal climate zone of Israel. Increased dwelling units’ number leads to higher total energy use on the one hand and mutual shading of new high-rise residential buildings on the other. Preserving solar rights for PV systems installation become more complex. The relation between urban density and solar rights in urban design, energy consumption and energy generation within plot borders and their implications are presented and discussed in the paper.


Author(s):  
Lei Zhang ◽  
Yijing Lu

Properly structured vehicle mileage fee systems may help transportation professionals and officials at all levels address prominent issues such as funding gaps, traffic congestion, and emissions. In theory, vehicles should be assessed a user fee equivalent to the full marginal cost not borne by users. The full marginal cost of auto and truck travel in different time periods on all roadways in Maryland was estimated. The study evaluated the impacts of such marginal-cost vehicle miles traveled (VMT) fees on travel behavior, revenue generation, equity, pollution, and greenhouse gas emissions in Maryland and the surrounding states of Delaware, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and West Virginia, and the District of Columbia. Results showed that with consideration of all driving externalities, the marginal-cost VMT fee for travel in Maryland during peak periods ranged from 0.20 to about 12.16 cents/mi and from 3.91 to about 45.33 cents/mi for cars and trucks, respectively. Compared with existing revenue policy, the marginal-cost VMT fee could reduce overall VMT by 7.65% in the multistate region covered by the quantitative model and by 7.81% just in Maryland. Also, air pollution and greenhouse gas emissions in Maryland could be reduced by 7.62% to 9.42% by pollutant type. Total revenue generation would increase by about 168% (including fuel taxes and bridge and roadway tolls). In regard to income equity, the middle-income group would be hurt most (largest consumer surplus decrease), while the highest-income group would be hurt least. Results also indicated that the proposed marginal-cost VMT fee in Maryland could affect neighboring states to varying degrees.


2010 ◽  
Vol 54 (3) ◽  
pp. 463-516 ◽  
Author(s):  
Shi-Ling Hsu ◽  
Robin Elliot

Abstract Canada’s greenhouse gas emissions have risen dramatically since the 1997 negotiation of the Kyoto Protocol, and that rise has continued through Canada’s 2002 ratification of the Protocol. Along with economic dislocation, constitutional barriers to regulation have sometimes been cited as the reason for caution in regulating greenhouse gases. This article critically evaluates the constitutional arguments and examines the policy considerations surrounding various regulatory instruments that might be used to reduce greenhouse gases. We conclude that the Canadian constitution does not present any significant barriers to federal or provincial regulation and that policy considerations strongly favour the use of two instruments: a federal carbon tax to impose a marginal cost on emissions and the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act to review federal projects that may increase greenhouse gases.


2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (22) ◽  
pp. 6482
Author(s):  
Katerina Sojkova ◽  
Martin Volf ◽  
Antonin Lupisek ◽  
Roman Bolliger ◽  
Tomas Vachal

Energy retrofitting of existing building stock has significant potential for the reduction of energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions. Roughly half of the CO2 emissions from Czech building stock are estimated to be allocated to residential buildings. Approximately one-third of the Czech residential building stock have already been retrofitted, but retrofitting mostly takes place in large cities due to greater income. A favourable concept for the mass retrofitting of residential building stock, affordable even in low-income regions, was of interest. For a reference building, multi-criteria assessment of numerous retrofitting measures was performed. The calculation involved different building elements, materials, solutions, and energy-efficiency levels in combination with various heating systems. The assessment comprised environmental impact, represented by operational and embodied primary energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions, and investment and operational costs using the annuity method. Analysis resulted in the identification of favourable retrofitting measures and showed that complex building retrofitting is advantageous from both a cost and an environmental point of view. The environmental burden could be decreased by approximately 10–30% even without photovoltaic installation, and costs per year could be decreased by around 40%.


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