How can we achieve sustainable buildings at community scale?

“Price is what you pay. Value is what you get.” – Warren Buffett

This statement perfectly captures my own experience of paying €750 monthly for a small, inefficient room that fails to provide even basic amenities like a reliable hot water system.

Despite the high cost, the quality of service and comfort is far from satisfactory. This disconnect between price and value highlights the critical need to rethink how we prioritize and evaluate buildings, shifting the focus from superficial costs to long-term functionality, sustainability, and efficiency. 

Buildings are pivotal in global energy consumption, especially amid an ongoing energy crisis driven by humanity’s ever-growing needs. The concept of Nearly Zero Energy Buildings (NZEB) represents a vital pathway, aiming to minimize energy losses while achieving optimal efficiency. NZEB refers to buildings with high energy performance, where the small amount of the energy required is met through renewable sources produced on-site or nearby. This approach ensures not only reduced energy consumption but a lower environmental impact. 

For existing buildings, retrofitting offers a practical solution to enhance energy performance. This involves improving the building envelope, walls, roofs, ceilings, and windows to prevent energy leaks and upgrading heating and cooling systems to optimize consumption. Tailoring retrofitting strategies to each building’s unique constraints can significantly reduce energy usage and costs. In contrast, new constructions provide greater flexibility for sustainable design. Advanced simulation tools allow us to model and evaluate energy scenarios during the planning phase, ensuring that new structures are inherently sustainable and equipped to minimize their lifecycle energy footprint. 

To move toward sustainable energy communities, we must prioritize stakeholder education and engagement. Promoting the retrofitting of existing structures through financial incentives, integrating cutting-edge technologies and materials into new buildings, and fostering policy frameworks that support energy efficiency at local, national, and international levels are all crucial steps. Together, these measures can help transition from isolated energy-efficient buildings to interconnected, sustainable energy communities. 

In my PhD research, I am striving to develop a framework that harnesses energy flexibility at the community scale. By enabling buildings to interact and share resources dynamically, this framework aims to optimize energy consumption, reduce waste, and support grid stability. To achieve this, I utilize OpenStreetMap data to extract building geometries and features, which are then incorporated into energy simulation models. Additionally, I employ scripts to evaluate various energy performance criteria, facilitating comprehensive analysis and optimization of community-scale energy systems. Such a community-scale approach not only enhances the efficiency of individual buildings but also leverages collective energy flexibility to address broader challenges, paving the way for resilient, sustainable urban environments.