Other, pp.371-380, 2019
Starting with the Stockholm Conference, countries around the world have realized that consuming, saving and even producing energy can be the main obstacle in solving environmental problems. Studies have shown that buildings can play a key role in the consumption as well as the production of energy; and one way forward can be to alter existing buildings in a way that they can contribute to the solution.
Although there are a lot of reasons to alter existing homes, there are two major barriers that need to be overcome in this regard: the first being the initial cost of retrofitting solutions and the other being the uncertain attitude of the occupants related to the proposed interventions. This study aimed at combining these two issues with building refurbishment strategies and renewable energy usage in existing old residential buildings. To this end, a building complex with three building blocks, having 364 inhabitants was selected as the case study area in Ankara, Turkey.
At first, the energy consumption of the existing case building was determined with the DesignBuilder software; and then three energy retrofit scenarios that included the refurbished case, the integrated renewable energy case and the combination of the two cases were proposed. Then the costs and payback periods of the scenarios were calculated with the Oska software. Thereafter, a questionnaire survey was carried out to determine the occupants’ attitude towards the implementation of the proposed energy retrofit measures. The questionnaire also included information on the energy consumption of the existing building and the three proposed interventions to point out their comparative benefits. This paper presents the energy-saving and producing measures proposed and the findings from the questionnaire regarding the reactions of occupants that change with the information about costs and payback periods of interventions rather than information about energy savings only.