Building retrofitting evaluation: Energy savings and cost effectiveness of building retrofits on Graduate Art Studios at the University of California, Los Angeles

2018-07-18Buildings consume 39% of CO₂ emissions and 70% of the electricity load in the United States (USGBC,2017). To improve the energy efficiency of the buildings, government has established building energy codes and guidelines to facilitate the energy savings in the building sector, such as Title 24 in the California Building Code. However, more than 75% of the existing residential and commercial buildings in California were constructed before the California Building Codes were established (California Air Resources Board, 2013). In addition, the degradation of the building equipment and systems could have significant impact on the building energy efficiency and the total energy usage. Thus, building retrofits will play an important role in improving the energy efficiency of building and energy savings. In terms of existing buildings, building retrofits can be categorized as case-by-case based upon the types of the buildings and requirements of the building owner. During the decision-making process of selecting the optimum building retrofits plan, it is difficult for building consultants, architects and engineers to efficiently evaluate the cost- effectiveness and energy savings due to retrofitting. In this thesis, energy modelling techniques (IES VE) and life-cycle cost analysis are implemented to provide evaluations and recommendations for UCLA Graduate Art Studio retrofits in California. Different building retrofits options are proposed and evaluated to indicate the trade-off between energy savings and economic benefits. The results show that the building retrofitting could have 23% reduction on energy use intensity (EUI). However, building retrofits options with the higher energy savings also have the higher life-cycle cost due to high maintenance, equipment cost and labor fees. The result of the thesis is expected to support the institutional building owners to apply efficient building retrofit strategies