Lifecycle environmental and economic performance of nearly zero energy buildings (NZEB) in Ireland

摘要

Directives in the European Union are ensuring that buildings in this region are moving towards nearly zero energy buildings (NZEB). For countries like Ireland, which has a temperate oceanic climate, a key to achieving NZEB is to have high thermal and air tightness performances of the building envelope. Consequently, as the operational energy of the building reduces, the embodied energy (and embodied global warming potential) typically increases as a proportion of the lifecycle energy of the building due to increased embodied energy of the building envelope and the lower operational energy.