<abstract xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p>Non-residential buildings in the European Union consume more than one third of the building sector’s total. Many non-residential buildings are owned by municipalities. This paper reports about an energy saving competition that was carried out in 91 municipal buildings in eight EU member states in 2019. For each public building an energy team was formed. The energy teams’ activities encompassed motivating changes in the energy use behaviour of employees and small investments. Two challenges added an element of gamification to the energy saving competition. To assess the success of the energy saving competition, an energy performance baseline was calculated using energy consumption data of each public building from previous years. Energy consumption in the competition year was monitored on a monthly base. After the competition the top energy savers from each country were determined by the percentage-based reduction of energy consumption compared to the baseline. On average, the buildings had an electricity and heat consumption in 2019 that was about 8 % and 7 %, respectively, lower than the baseline. As an additional data source for the evaluation, a survey among energy team members was conducted at the beginning and after the energy competition. Support from superiors, employee interest and motivation and behaviour change as assessed by energy team members show a positive, if weak or moderate, correlation with changes in electricity consumption, but not with changes in heat consumption.</p></abstract>

Non-residential buildings in the European Union consume more than one third of the building sector’s total. Many non-residential buildings are owned by municipalities. This paper reports about an energy saving competition that was carried out in 91 municipal buildings in eight EU member states in 2019. For each public building an energy team was formed. The energy teams’ activities encompassed motivating changes in the energy use behaviour of employees and small investments. Two challenges added an element of gamification to the energy saving competition. To assess the success of the energy saving competition, an energy performance baseline was calculated using energy consumption data of each public building from previous years. Energy consumption in the competition year was monitored on a monthly base. After the competition the top energy savers from each country were determined by the percentage-based reduction of energy consumption compared to the baseline. On average, the buildings had an electricity and heat consumption in 2019 that was about 8 % and 7 %, respectively, lower than the baseline. As an additional data source for the evaluation, a survey among energy team members was conducted at the beginning and after the energy competition. Support from superiors, employee interest and motivation and behaviour change as assessed by energy team members show a positive, if weak or moderate, correlation with changes in electricity consumption, but not with changes in heat consumption.

Top Energy Saver of the Year: Results of an Energy Saving Competition in Public Buildings

Environmental and Climate Technologies

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 3.0 License.

Non-residential buildings in the European Union consume more than one third of the building sector’s total. Many non-residential buildings are owned by...

Top Energy Saver of the Year: Results of an Energy Saving Competition in Public Buildings

Published Online: Dec 14, 2020

Page range: 278 - 293

DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/rtuect-2020-0103

Keywords
Energy use behaviour, non-residential buildings, workplace

© 2020 Jan Kaselofsky et al., published by Sciendo

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 3.0 License.

Top Energy Saver of the Year: Results of an Energy Saving Competition in Public Buildings

Published Online: Dec 14, 2020

Page range: 278 - 293

DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/rtuect-2020-0103

KeywordsEnergy use behaviour, non-residential buildings, workplace

© 2020 Jan Kaselofsky et al., published by Sciendo

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 3.0 License.

Keywords
Energy use behaviour, non-residential buildings, workplace