Category: yingli

Latest Study Dives Into the Complex Interplay of Electrification and Energy Efficient Retrofits (EER)

Nathan Kurtz on

As part of SBS Lab’s joint US-Ireland R&D Project led by Yizhi Yang, Rosina Adhikari, Yingli Lou, and Wangda Zuo from Pennsylvania State University, James O’Donnell from University College Dublin, and Neil Hewitt from Ulster University a new study has been posted. Given that the U.S. residential sector accounts for 56% of operational carbon emissions from buildings, the decarbonization efforts in this sector are critical for net-zero carbon goals. Our study titled “Long-Term Impact of Electrification and Retrofits of U.S. Residential Buildings in Diverse Locations” investigates the complexities of electrification and energy efficient retrofits (EER) across varying climates and dynamic grid clean energy penetrations.

Some of the key insights from this study include:

  • Electrification has the potential to significantly reduce long-term emissions as clean energy adoption increases.
  • However, decarbonization is not guaranteed due to mismatches between clean energy availability and demand, particularly in heating-dominant climates.
  • Electrification can reduce energy burden and peak demand in cooling-dominant locations, while in colder regions, it increases energy burden (up to 8.24%) and shifts peak demand from summer to winter.
  • Including investment costs, the implicit energy burden in cold climates can rise to 8.35%.
  • For already electrified buildings in Denver and Great Falls, EER measures can shorten payback periods by up to 48.98%.

These insights reveal a tradeoff: while electrification offers superior carbon emission reductions, EER measures better alleviate energy burdens. Policymakers, energy planners, and stakeholders must consider all these dynamics to balance decarbonization with economic impacts on households. Reed more about these findings at this link (Free by February 14, 2025).

SBS Lab US-Ireland R&D project team at Ulster University

Nathan Kurtz on

Last week, Prof. Zuo and Ph.D. student Yizhi Yang attended the joint project meeting at Ulster University. They were able to meet and discuss their joint US-NI-Rol project “Intelligent Data Harvesting for Multi-Scale Building Stock Classification and Energy Performance Prediction.” While the SBS team was in Belfast, Northern Ireland they were able to visit and tour Ulster University’s heat pump facility. The team also met with officers from the Department for the Economy NI to better tune their research to support the policy-making process regarding energy-efficient buildings and renewable energy.

This research project is supported by National Science Foundation (NSF), Department for the Economy NI, and Science Foundation Ireland (SFI). The project is a collaborative project with Pennsylvania State University, University College Dublin, and Ulster University. The project aims to reduce residential building energy consumption and related greenhouse gas emissions across the three jurisdictions. This goal is being achieved by using the expertise in green engineering from the NI team, building modeling and machine learning from the US team, and the information theory of the RoI team. We are thankful for the warm and generous welcome from the Ulster University team and excited to continue working with all parties on this important research project.

 

Yizhi Yang Presents at ASHRAE SCANVAC HVAC Cold Climate Conference

Nathan Kurtz on

SBS Lab Ph.D. student Yizhi Yang presented at the ASHRAE SCANVAC HVAC Cold Climate Conference, 2023. She presented on building decarbonization in U.S. cold climates. Her research looks at the carbon emission reductions that can happen from retrofitting existing office buildings in these cold climates. This is a joint research project with former Ph.D. students Yingli Lou and Yunyang Ye.

SBS Lab Members’ Novel Method to Assess Carbon Reduction Potential of Buildings Published

Julia Ho on

Yizhi Yang, Yingli Lou, Chris Payne, and Yunyang He have developed a model to “comprehensively assess the long-term carbon intensity reduction potential of aggregated commercial buildings on a county-by-county basis in the continental U.S.” Yizhi Yang is a current PhD student in the SBS Lab, and Yingli Lou and Yunyang He are lab graduates. Their paper summarizing the model and its application to U.S. K-12 buildings has been published in the Energy and Buildings Journal and is available for free until March 11, 2023.

Their case study weighed the effects of climate, energy sources, and building retrofits on K-12 buildings in 14 different climate zones from 2022 to 2050. By considering these effects simultaneously, they were able to predict what retrofits would be most effective and when; for example, they predicted that in 2022 reducing lighting power density in Oregon schools would most effectively increase energy savings, but in 2050 improving roof insulation will be a more effective energy saver because Oregon will have transitioned to clean energy sources for the majority of their electricity. They also concluded that there was a wide range of energy-saving potential across schools and that, depending on the primary energy source, energy savings potentials are not guaranteed to decrease (the example of this phenomenon being Mississippi’s predicted 2044 nuclear plant shutdown, which might be replaced with coal and natural gas plants.)

This case study demonstrates the capabilities of the author’s model, which can help policymakers, engineers, and community members estimate the impacts of different retrofits on buildings in their communities. Future work includes considering future weather predictions in the model, potential policies such as a carbon tax, and increasing the accuracy of buildings estimated in the model with building codes and climate zone geometrical information for climate reduction.

You can read the paper here: https://lnkd.in/efqdSVTr

Yingli Lou Celebrates Graduation

Julia Ho on

SBS post-doctoral scholar Dr. Yingli Lou belatedly celebrated her PhD graduation, which was delayed because of COVID, at the University of Colorado Boulder last week. Dr. Lou recently accepted a job offer from the National Renewable Energy Laboratory and will begin her work there in a few months. We are so happy for Yingli and wish her all the best in Boulder! Congratulations and good luck!

Lab Members Attend SimBuild 2022 Conference

Julia Ho on

Five SBS Lab researchers attended the SimBuild 2022 conference held in Chicago, IL on September 14-16, along with Professor Wangda Zuo. Three of those lab members, Yingli Lou, Kathryn Hinkelman, and Cary Faulkner, presented research while attending. The focus of this year’s conference was “Better Buildings, Less Carbon: Supporting the Transition to A Clean and Just Climate.” We are proud to say that the lab members in attendance have contributed significantly to this aim through their research, and we are excited to see more of their accomplishments in the future.

Yizhi Yang, Yingli Luo, and Cary Faulkner were funded by the SimBuild conference scholarship, receiving three of the 11 offered awards. Kathryn Hinkelman was funded by the US Department of Energy’s iBuild Fellowship. John Castellini was supported by CU Boulder’s departmental travel grant.

Congratulations, all!

Photos from left to right: team photo at the SimBuild conference; Kathryn Hinkelman presenting; team celebration dinner.

Mayor of Makassar Interviewed about Smart Garden Alley Project

Julia Ho on

During his visit to Washington DC this summer as part of the US-ASEAN Smart Cities Partnership, Makassar City Mayor Mohammad Ramdhan Pomanto gave an interview about the Smart Garden Alley project, a collaboration between the city and SBS Lab researchers Katy Hinkelman, Yingli Lou, and Yizhi Yang. Mayor Pomanto explained the motives behind the smart garden alley project, its goals to promote sustainability and urban farming, and the benefits it has had on local residents. The SBS Lab is working with Mayor Pomanto and the city to make these garden alleys “smart” through collecting data from sensor networks to inform urban farming practices and increase comfort in garden alleys. To watch the interview, click here.

Related: Penn State’s article about the mayor’s visit.

 

Lab members, Cary Faulkner, Yingli Lou, and Yizhi Yang received scholarships to attend the 2022 ASHRAE & IBPSA-USA BPAC and SimBuild Conference

Yizhi Yang on
simbuild

Congratulation to three lab members, Cary Faulkner, Yingli Lou, and Yizhi Yang, have been selected to receive up to $1500/person in scholarship funds to attend the 2022 ASHRAE & IBPSA-USA BPAC and SimBuild Conference. The theme of the conference, “Better Buildings, Less Carbon: Supporting the Transition to A Clean and Just Climate” focuses on improving the decision-making process through the application of simulation and modeling over the entire building life cycle. More information about the conference can be found here.

 

Lab member, Yingli Lou, had successfully defended her PhD dissertation on “Interconnections of Energy Consumption, Carbon Emission, and Economic Impacts for Sustainable Buildings”.

Yizhi Yang on
07/22: Cake for Yingli’s Ph.D. graduation

SBS lab member Yingli Lou successfully defended her Ph.D. thesis titled Interconnections of Energy Consumption, Carbon Emission, and Economic Impacts for Sustainable Buildings.

This dissertation aims to reveal the connections among building energy consumption, carbon emissions, and related economic impacts.  First, this dissertation developed individualized empirical baselines for existing buildings in the operation stage that are consistent with their modeled baselines in the design stage. Second, this dissertation developed a novel method to predict the carbon emission reduction potential of building retrofits by using dynamically changing electricity emission factors under different clean energy adoption scenarios. At last, this dissertation proposed a systematic economic evaluation method to investigate the economic impacts of carbon emission trading schemes on building retrofits.

Dr. Yingli Lou’s research focuses on building energy performance evaluation, large-scale building energy simulation, and carbon emissions from buildings. During the three years of her Ph.D. study, Yingli published 9 journal papers and developed the open-source Building Energy Models for Commercial Buildings Based on CBECS Data. In addition, she has contributed to multiple grant proposals and secured more than $5M projects from DOE and NSF.

Congratulations to Dr. Lou on this well-deserved success and wish her all the best in her professional career!

2      2022.07: Celebrate Yingli’s graduation

Paper on The Economic Impacts of Carbon Emission Trading Scheme on Building Retrofits has been published in Building and Environment

Yizhi Yang on

As a popular emission reduction tool, the carbon emission trading scheme (ETS) can potentially add an economic incentive for building owners to retrofit buildings in addition to the cost savings in energy. As a part of a comprehensive research project funded by US National Science Foundation, the Science Foundation Ireland, and the Department for the Economy in Northern Ireland, our team has investigated the additional economic benefits of building retrofits from carbon credits via the ETS. We found that carbon prices have significant economic impacts on building retrofits. With the relatively low forecasted time-variant carbon prices (around 10 USD per ton), the economic impacts of ETS on building retrofits are small. When carbon prices increase, the impacts of ETS would be up to 25% for 50 USD per ton (current prices in European Union) and 51% for 100 USD per ton.

This work has been published under the title “The economic impacts of carbon emission trading scheme on building retrofits:  A case study with U.S. medium office buildings” in the journal Building and Environment. The full paper is available here.

The first author of this paper, Yingli Lou, is a Ph.D. student in the SBS lab, where her research focuses on large-scale building energy simulation and carbon emissions from buildings.

Congratulations to Yingli on publishing this paper!

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