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Recently, there has been a shift toward the embodied energy assessment of buildings. However, the impact of material service life on the life-cycle embodied energy has received little attention. We aimed to address this knowledge gap, particularly in the context of the UAE and investigated the embodied energy associated with the use of concrete and other materials commonly used in residential buildings in the hot desert climate of the UAE.

Using input–output based hybrid analysis, we quantified the life-cycle embodied energy of a villa in the UAE with over 50 years of building life using the average, minimum, and maximum material service life values. Mathematical calculations were performed using MS Excel, and a detailed bill of quantities with >170 building materials and components of the villa were used for investigation.

For the base case, the initial embodied energy was 57% (7390.5 GJ), whereas the recurrent embodied energy was 43% (5,690 GJ) of the life-cycle embodied energy based on average material service life values. The proportion of the recurrent embodied energy with minimum material service life values was increased to 68% of the life-cycle embodied energy, while it dropped to 15% with maximum material service life values.

The findings provide new data to guide building construction in the UAE and show that recurrent embodied energy contributes significantly to life-cycle energy demand. Further, the study of material service life variations provides deeper insights into future building material specifications and management considerations for building maintenance.

The recurrent embodied energy (REE) is the energy consumed in the maintenance, replacement and retrofit processes of a facility. The purpose of this paper was to analyze the relationship of REE with the service life and life cycle embodied energy. The amount of variation in the reported REE values is also determined and discussed.

A qualitative approach that is known as the literature based discovery (LBD) was adopted. Existing literature was surveyed to gather case studies and to analyze the reported values of REE.

The reported values of REE showed considerable variation across referred studies. It was also found that the reported REE values demonstrated a moderate positive correlation with the service life but a very strong positive correlation with the life cycle embodied energy of both the residential and commercial facilities.

This review paper pointed out the importance of the maintenance and replacement processes in reducing the life cycle energy use in a facility. Future research could focus on performing case studies to evaluate this relationship.

The findings highlight the significance of REE in reducing the life cycle energy impacts of a facility. As facility managers routinely deal with maintenance and replacement processes, they hold an important responsibility of reducing the life cycle energy.

The findings of the paper would motivate the facilities management professionals to prefer long service life materials and components during the postconstruction phases of a built facility.

The energy required to operate office buildings has been the focus of much research in the past three decades. There have been limited attempts to quantify the embodied energy consumed in construction. Some embodied energy studies have been relatively detailed. But the energy embodied in fixtures, fittings and furniture which is used by occupiers of buildings is rarely mentioned. The potential significance of the energy embodied in fixtures, fittings and furniture has yet to be established. Aims to establish the likely importance of the energy embodied in fixtures, fittings and furniture relative to other life cycle energy requirements of office buildings in temperate climates. Implementation actions are suggested for the optimisation of the energy embodied in fixtures, fittings and furniture used in buildings. Assists facility managers and businesses with their decision making with respect to the environmental impacts associated with energy use throughout the life cycle of their buildings.

The purpose of this paper is to quantify fitout churn in office buildings to more accurately evaluate the recurrent embodied energy in life cycle assessment studies.

Three research methods were used in the context of Central Business District (CBD) office buildings in Sydney. Method 1 involved leasing records from 528 office buildings; method 2, a leasing history from a selective sample of three prime grade office buildings; method 3, a targeted survey of 21 property professionals concerning fitout churn cycle estimates.

Prime buildings are the area of most interest to fitout churn because they represent a large proportion of total office floor area. The churn rate differs according to office tenancy type (as defined by small, medium and large leased areas). Large tenants occupy the majority of floor space. Lease duration as obtained from Method 1, offers a reasonable proxy for predicting fitout churn. Using this method coupled with weighted-average calculations, the data indicate a fitout churn rate of 8.2 years.

Variability concerning the situational context of Sydney CBD office buildings restricts broad generalisability of the findings. However, the research method used in this study would enable broad-based comparison and the potential for verification.

The main contribution of the research is to improve the ability to accurately predict fitout churn cycles as previous work only involves limited case studies and arbitrary estimates, thus lacking a strong evidence based.

Crucial transition of the Indian residential building sector into a low-emission economy require an in-depth understanding of the potentials for retrofitting the existing building stock. There are, however, limited studies that have recognised the interdependencies and trade-offs in the embodied energy and life cycle impact assessment of retrofit interventions. This research appraises the life cycle assessment and embodied energy output of a residential building in India to assess the environmental implications of selected retrofit scenarios.

This study utilises a single case study building project in South India to assess the effectiveness and impact of three retrofit scenarios based on life cycle assessment (LCA) and embodied energy (EE) estimates. The LCA was conducted using SimaPro version 9.3 and with background data from Ecoinvent database version 3.81. The EE estimates were calculated using material coefficients from relevant databases in the published literature. Monte Carlo Simulation is then used to allow for uncertainties in the estimates for the scenarios.

The three key findings that materialized from the study are as follows: (1) the retrofitting of Indian residential buildings could achieve up to 20% reduction in the life cycle energy emissions, (2) the modification of the building envelope and upgrading of the building service systems could suffice in providing optimum operational energy savings, if the electricity from the grid is sourced from renewable plants, and (3) the production of LEDs and other building services systems has the highest environmental impacts across a suite of LCA indicators.

The retrofitting of residential buildings in India will lead to better and improved opportunities to meet the commitments in the Paris Climate Change Agreement and will lead to enhanced savings for building owners.

This paper proposes an intact framework for building life cycle energy estimation (LCEE), which includes three major energy sources: embodied, operational and mobile.

A systematic review is conducted to summarize the selected 109 studies published during 2012–2021 related to quantifying building energy consumption and its major estimation methodologies, tools and key influence parameters of three energy sources.

Results show that the method limitations and the variety of potential parameters lead to significant energy estimation errors. An in-depth qualitative discussion is conducted to identify research knowledge gaps and future directions.

With societies and economies developing rapidly across the world, a large amount of energy is consumed at an alarming rate. Unfortunately, its huge environmental impacts have forced many countries to take energy issues as urgent social problems to be solved. Even though the construction industry, as the one of most important carbon contributors, has been constantly and academically active, researchers still have not arrived at a clear consensus for system boundaries of life cycle energy. Besides, there is a significant difference between the actual and estimated values in countless current and advanced energy estimation approaches in the literature.

The purpose of this paper is to emphasize the importance of a life cycle approach in facilities management practices to reduce the carbon footprint of built facilities. A model to holistic life cycle energy and carbon reduction is also proposed.

A literature-based discovery approach was applied to collect, analyze and synthesize the results of published case studies from around the globe. The energy use results of 95 published case studies were analyzed to derive conclusions.

A comparison of energy-efficient and conventional facilities revealed that decreasing operating energy may increase the embodied energy components. Additionally, the analysis of 95 commercial buildings indicated that nearly 10 per cent of the total US carbon emissions was influenced by facilities management practices.

The results were derived from case studies that belonged to various locations across the globe and included facilities constructed with a variety of materials.

The proposed approach to holistic carbon footprint reduction can guide facility management research and practice to make meaningful contributions to the efforts for creating a sustainable built environment.

This paper quantifies the extent to which a facilities management professional can contribute to the global efforts of reducing carbon emission.

This research informs the intersection of climate and heritage policy development by examining the history of US energy policy as it relates to historic buildings, emerging policy tools to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and the implications of a changing legislative landscape on historic buildings through the case of New York City.

This study employs a multi-method approach, including a review of US energy codes; discourse analysis of government records, energy studies, and reports related to historic buildings and energy; select research into energy-related heritage policy at the municipal level; and geospatial and statistical methods to analyze policy implications in the case study of New York City.

Historic buildings have long been afforded exemptions from energy code compliance in the US, and these waivers are widespread. Contemporary operating energy and greenhouse gas data, as well as energy justice findings about whom these waivers privilege, challenge these exemptions and signal a need for significant policy reform in light of climate change.

This study questions longstanding rhetoric about historic buildings being inherently green and supports the need for more evidence-based research to undergird heritage policy reform that is equitable and climate-responsive.

The purpose of this study is to quantify the energy heating performance of apartment buildings in Kosovo built after 2003 and compare it against the energy heating performance of buildings in member states of EU and selected European countries.

This paper takes a case study approach focussed on the assessment of the heating energy performance of the building. This approach facilitated a detailed calculation of the selected materials’ energy performance used in a representative building structure in Kosovo comparing with passive buildings standard and energy heating performance of buildings in member states of EU and selected European countries.

Results of quantitative research find that the energy heating performance of apartment buildings in Kosovo built after 2003 is far higher than that of passive buildings standard and is better than the average annual energy heating performance of apartment buildings in member states of the EU and selected European countries.

The research provides new knowledge regarding energy heating performance in new residential buildings in Kosovo and compares the findings with earlier research and energy consumption in other selected European countries. The research provides great benefits for researchers and practitioners working in the field of energy management as it compares the energy performance of residential buildings across Europe.

This paper provides a perspective on investigating the energy performance of a building structure of a residential apartment building in Prishtina, Kosovo. By unveiling the level of energy consumption of a residential apartment building in Kosovo representative of the new construction period can help the facility managers to acknowledge the standards they must achieve to refurbish the old building stock to achieve at least the same standard as the buildings in the new construction period.