Buildings emit 4x more CO2 than they were designed to

The Building Performance Evaluation is an £8M study by InnovateUK which assessed the performance of 50 commercial buildings over 4 years from design through construction and commissioning into operation. It found a systemic problem that, on average, the buildings emitted 3.7x more carbon dioxide than the design specification. The best example was 2x worse and the worst example was 10x.

These emissions all came from poor energy usage in the buildings. It is equivalent to buying a new car which is said to provide 60 mpg and then having to foot the bill for 15 mpg. In the buildings which were assessed the most common problems were out of hours operation and incorrect building control.

The finding of the BPE would suggest that design standards cannot deliver lower emissions on their own and that operational ratings to encourage on-going optimisation is required.

For a copy of the detailed report go to the Gov.UK website here.