Diana Ürge-Vorsatz

Global Energy Assessment (GEA): Energy End-Use: Buildings

Executive Summary Buildings are key to a sustainable future because their design, construction, operation, and the activities in buildings are significant contributors to energy-related sustainability challenges – reducing energy demand in buildings can play one of the most important roles in solving these challenges. More specifically: The buildings sector and peoples activities in buildings are responsible for approximately 31% of global final energy demand, approximately one-third of energy-related CO 2 emissions, approximately two-thirds of halocarbon, and approximately 25–33% of black carbon emissions. Several energy-related problems affecting human health and productivity take place in buildings, including mortality and morbidity due to poor indoor air quality or inadequate indoor temperatures. Therefore, improving buildings and their equipment offers one of the entry points to addressing these challenges. More efficient energy and material use, as well as sustainable energy supply in buildings, are critical to tackling the sustainability-related challenges outlined in the GEA. Recent major advances in building design, know-how, technology, and policy have made it possible for global building energy use to decline significantly. A number of lowenergy and passive buildings, both retrofitted and newly constructed, already exist, demonstrating that low level of building energy performance is achievable. With the application of on-site and community-scale renewable energy sources, several buildings and communities could become zero-net-energy users and zero-greenhouse gas (GHG) emitters, or net energy suppliers. Recent advances in materials and know-how make new buildings that use 10–40% of the final heating and cooling energy of conventional new buildings cost-effective in all world regions and climate zones.

Drivers of market transformation: analysis of the Hungarian lighting success story

Abstract Over the past 5 years, Hungary has experienced one of the most remarkable market successes in a key energy-efficiency technology: compact fluorescent lighting. While market shares of compact fluorescent lamps (CFLs) were negligible half a decade ago, today residential CFL market penetration exceeds that in many industrialised economies, ranking Hungary among the eight countries in Europe with the highest penetration rates. Since substantial efforts have been invested internationally to promote the proliferation of CFLs often with limited results, the understanding of the Hungarian success can bring us closer to an effective planning of programmes and policies designed to transform the markets of energy-efficient technologies around the world. Therefore, this papers goal is to provide an insight into the driving forces which have contributed to this outstanding market success, and to investigate how the findings can apply in designing market transformation programmes aimed at increasing the penetration of cost-effective energy-efficient technologies internationally. The paper presents the results of nationally representative residential surveys and a large number of in-depth interviews with households, industry and other market participants. The market success is analysed in detail and differences in CFL penetration among the market segments provide an important clue for understanding which market barriers are the key in hampering market transformation, and which factors contributed to the overcoming of these barriers. The research suggests that the described market transformation occurred autonomously and rapidly. In the absence of major external influences, we attribute this market success to the combination of two key factors, among other contributing factors. First, the fierce market competition among CFL suppliers in Hungary has resulted in decreased prices and strong marketing campaigns, raising awareness substantially. This high awareness provided a fertile ground for an increase in CFL sales after drastic nominal electricity price hikes pressed consumers to start to care about cutting utility bills. Based on the findings about the various drivers of the market success the authors draw lessons for the design of effective market transformation programmes. In addition, we recommend an amendment to the commonly used taxonomy of market barriers prevailing in energy-efficient product markets.

Global scenarios of urban density and its impacts on building energy use through 2050

Significance Urban density significantly impacts urban energy use and the quality of life of urban residents. Here, we provide a global-scale analysis of future urban densities and associated energy use in the built environment under different urbanization scenarios. The relative importance of urban density and energy-efficient technologies varies geographically. In developing regions, urban density tends to be the more critical factor in building energy use. Large-scale retrofitting of building stock later rather than sooner results in more energy savings by the middle of the century. Reducing building energy use, improving the local environment, and mitigating climate change can be achieved through systemic efforts that take potential co-benefits and trade-offs of both higher urban density and building energy efficiency into account. Although the scale of impending urbanization is well-acknowledged, we have a limited understanding of how urban forms will change and what their impact will be on building energy use. Using both top-down and bottom-up approaches and scenarios, we examine building energy use for heating and cooling. Globally, the energy use for heating and cooling by the middle of the century will be between 45 and 59 exajoules per year (corresponding to an increase of 7–40% since 2010). Most of this variability is due to the uncertainty in future urban densities of rapidly growing cities in Asia and particularly China. Dense urban development leads to less urban energy use overall. Waiting to retrofit the existing built environment until markets are ready in about 5 years to widely deploy the most advanced renovation technologies leads to more savings in building energy use. Potential for savings in energy use is greatest in China when coupled with efficiency gains. Advanced efficiency makes the least difference compared with the business-as-usual scenario in South Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa but significantly contributes to energy savings in North America and Europe. Systemic efforts that focus on both urban form, of which urban density is an indicator, and energy-efficient technologies, but that also account for potential co-benefits and trade-offs with human well-being can contribute to both local and global sustainability. Particularly in growing cities in the developing world, such efforts can improve the well-being of billions of urban residents and contribute to mitigating climate change by reducing energy use in urban areas.

Unpacking the spaces and politics of energy poverty: path-dependencies, deprivation and fuel switching in post-communist Hungary

This paper focuses on the embeddedness of energy poverty – understood as the inability to secure a socially and materially necessitated level of energy services in the home – in the socio-technical legacies inherited from past development trajectories, as well as broader economic and institutional landscapes. Using Hungary as an example, we explore the recent expansion of energy poverty across different demographic and income groups. While much of the mainstream literature focuses on cases where energy poverty affects distinct social groups and issues, our analyses examine the systemic implications of a form of deprivation that involves a much wider range of social and spatial strata. We develop a framework that highlights the different ways in which inadequate access to energy services has resulted in the emergence of new political reconfigurations among a variety of actors, while prompting the articulation of household strategies with far-reaching structural consequences.

Six research priorities for cities and climate change

Xuemei Bai and colleagues call for long-term, cross-disciplinary studies to reduce carbon emissions and urban risks from global warming. Xuemei Bai and colleagues call for long-term, cross-disciplinary studies to reduce carbon emissions and urban risks from global warming.

Locking in positive climate responses in cities

Well-intended climate actions are confounding each other. Cities must take a strategic and integrated approach to lock into a climate-resilient and low-emission future.

Towards demand-side solutions for mitigating climate change

Research on climate change mitigation tends to focus on supply-side technology solutions. A better understanding of demand-side solutions is missing. We propose a transdisciplinary approach to identify demand-side climate solutions, investigate their mitigation potential, detail policy measures and assess their implications for well-being.

Tradable Certificates for Energy Savings: Opportunities, Challenges, and Prospects for Integration with other Market Instruments in the Energy Sector

Policy portfolios that include tradable green certificates have been introduced in several European countries to foster market-driven penetration of renewable energy sources. Another widely analysed type of market-based instrument in the energy sector is the tradable emission allowance. Recently tradable certificates for energy savings as a tool to stimulate energy efficiency investments and deliver energy savings have attracted the attention of policy makers. While such schemes have been introduced in different forms in Italy and the Great Britain and considered in other European countries, there is an ongoing debate over their effectiveness and applicability. The paper describes the concept and main elements of schemes that involve tradable certificates for energy savings (TCES) and how these have been put into practice in Italy and the Great Britain. It then compares TCES schemes with energy taxation and mandatory demand-side management (DSM) programs using a set of four criteria. Integration with green certificates and CO2 emissions trading schemes is examined and some possibilities for practical implementation are outlined.

City transformations in a 1.5 °C warmer world

Meeting the ambitions of the Paris Agreement will require rapid and massive decarbonization of cities, as well as adaptation. Capacity and requirement differs across cities, with challenges and opportunities for transformational action in both the Global North and South.

Renewable Electricity Support Schemes in Central Europe: A Case of Incomplete Policy Transfer

Despite the relatively high potential contribution of renewable energy sources (RES) to the energy mixes of the countries in Central Europe and the officially stated support for RES deployment, progress towards implementing that commitment has been slow. This article examines the content and coherence of support schemes for the promotion of RES adopted by the Czech Republic, Hungary, and Poland. We argue that RES support schemes suffer from some weaknesses that are a function of the means by which renewable energy objectives were imported into the region. The preparations for accession to the EU encouraged a process of “policy transfer” of policies negotiated and designed elsewhere. Consequently, policies sometimes suffer from technical deficiencies, lack of political support, implementation and enforcement obstacles. The challenge now is to review the policies adopted during the transition period, rationalise their legal superstructure, and implement them in the context of well-developed strategic objectives with political and stakeholder understanding and support.