Energy consumption gap study in the administrative building

Abstract

The European Union nowadays is paying extra attention to global warming-causing gases and minimizing energy consumption. Here buildings play a big role; they make up about 36% of the whole EU‘s CO2 emissions. That is why the more effective building energy consumption is, the less it affects nature and global warming. A number of studies have found that although buildings are designed to be energy efficient or nearly zero energy, the actual energy consumption at A and A+ class buildings may even exceed 1.5–2.5 times what was declared in the energy performance certificate. This discrepancy is called the Energy Performance Gap, or EPG, for short. This paper analyzes the causes of administrative building EPG occurrence and, based on actual monitoring data, evaluates the possibility of reducing the gap between theoretical and actual energy consumption. Results of the analysis showed that the essential causes of the EPG are the inefficiencies of the building’s HVAC system management.