Improving energy performance of the UK housing through the implementation of Passive House standards

Abstract

The UK government has committed itself to achieve net-zero on Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emissions by 2050. The UK housing sector is one of the major contributors to GHGs and over 60% of the energy used in the UK residential sector relates to heating. Thanks to their extremely high fabric standards, Passive House strategies and standards can significantly reduce the heating energy demand by 80%. Yet, these strategies are not widely implemented in the UK compared to other European countries such as Germany. This paper aims to explain such strategies and assess the effects of upgrading a typical UK house to both Part L of the UK Building Regulations and Passive House standards to compare the energy performances before and after upgrading. The case study building is modelled in EnergyPlus and the energy performances are compared. The results reveal that the heating energy consumptions reduced significantly by over 78% when the Passive House standards were implemented