Evaluating the effectiveness of energy efficiency policies in the domestic real estate sector

Posted on: 3 July 2014
By: mackene
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Commissioned by the Green Construction Board’s Valuation & Demand Group, the Association for the Conservation of Energy, in partnership with Sweett Group, has delivered a comprehensive but high level qualitative and quantitative review of energy policies targeted at residential buildings over the last 20 years. The main purpose of the work is to support the civil service to maintain a long view on ‘what works’ in residential energy efficiency programmes as staff are turned over. The outputs have been brought together in an interactive dashboard designed as a tool to bring officials up to speed on residential energy efficiency programmes quickly. This is accompanied by a full report and an executive summary. To date, the tool has been presented to, and tested with, DECC, BIS, the Cabinet Office.

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CBx

Posted on: 2 July 2014
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The public forum for building energy professionals, at the cutting-edge of narrowing the performance gap through sharing data, information and best practice. Its mission is to provide property professionals with the tools to understand and validate energy and carbon data to reduce the performance gap in buildings.

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CASCADE Project

Posted on: 27 June 2014
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The European CASCADE project on local energy leadership has enabled 75 cities from 19 European countries to work together towards the Europe 2020 climate and energy targets  Following three years of sharing knowledge and experience across Europe, the CASCADE project on local energy leadership is coming to an end, but information is available online.

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Working together to save energy

Posted on: 25 June 2014
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The final report of the Kingston University Smart Communities project has been published, together with presentations from a conference which was held to launch the report. In broad terms, the Smart Communities findings support the contemporary policy focus on demand-side action, community energy and energy consumption feedback. At the same time, the project highlights the long term and challenging nature of these strategies, and the implications of this for funding. The findings emphasis a lack of energy know-how among householders as a key constraint on change, and identifies ways in which more widespread know-how might be developed.

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A housing stock fit for the future: Making home energy efficiency a national infrastructure priority

Posted on: 24 June 2014
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The report outlines the economic benefits of home retrofit. It calls for home energy efficiency to be made a national infrastructure priority and for all political parties to commit to a target of 1 million deep retrofits a year by 2020.

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Carbon penalties & incentives: A review of policy effectiveness for carbon reduction and energy efficiency in the commercial buildings sector

Posted on: 18 June 2014
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This study uses a combination of primary survey, literature review and expert stakeholder dialogue to assess the effectiveness of a range of current and pending policy instruments deemed to have a direct or indirect effect on energy and carbon performance in the UK commercial buildings sector. In addition to consideration of the instruments on an individual basis, the assessment of the functionality and effectiveness of the policy framework as a whole is a notable innovation of the study.

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Climate change: Implications for the energy sector

Posted on: 18 June 2014
By: mackene
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A briefing published jointly by the World Energy Council (WEC), the University of Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership (CISL), the Cambridge Judge Business School, and the European Climate Foundation, brings into sharp focus the energy-related findings of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Fifth Assessment Report for policymakers and business leaders in the energy sector. It identifies the need to incorporate climate change mitigation and adaptation measures into energy policy making, infrastructure planning, and investment decisions.

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Energy retrofits of owner-occupied homes

Posted on: 11 June 2014
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This issue (Vol.47, Issue 4, 2014) of the journal Building Research & Information explores policy opportunities for energy retrofitting of owner occupied homes, and in particular, the need for greater focus on the human dimensions of the retrofitting process.

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How much energy does your building use?

Posted on: 5 June 2014
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There is not enough investment put into FMs at a level appropriate to the complexity of the building and systems they manage, says a report to be published this week. How Much Energy Does Your Building Use, published by the non-profit National Energy Foundation (NEF), states that this oversight goes on to hinder the energy performance of buildings.

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Cities exchanging on local energy leadership (CASCADE): Toolkit

Posted on: 29 May 2014
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A new toolkit produced by the EU project CASCADE, which ran for three years and concluded in April 2014, aims to offer inspiration and guidance to city experts and decision makers on how to improve the implementation of climate change and energy policies in their cities. The project involved networking and peer-to-peer learning on local energy leadership across 19 European countries, and focused on three main themes: energy efficiency in buildings and districts; renewable energy sources and distributed energy generation; and energy in urban transport. The toolkit consists of a library of peer-to-peer learning tools and a collection of CASCADE good practices.

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