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Abstract: Building energy use accounts for almost 50% of the total CO2 emissions in the UK. Most of the research has focused on reducing the operational impact of buildings, however in recent years many studies have indicated the significance of embodied energy in different building types. This paper primarily focuses on illustrating the relative importance of operational and embodied energy in a flexible use light distribution warehouse. The building is chosen for the study as it is relatively easy to model and represents many distribution centres and industrial warehouses in Europe. A carbon footprinting study was carried out by conducting an inventory of the major installed materials with potentially significant carbon impact and material substitutions covering the building structure. Ecotect computer simulation program was used to determine the energy consumption for the 25 years design life of the building. This paper evaluates alternative design strategies for the envelope of the building and their effects on the whole life emissions by investigating both embodied and operational implications of changing the envelope characteristics. The results provide an insight to quantify the total amount of CO2 emissions saved through design optimisation by modeling embodied and operational energy. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

The decarbonisation of heat supply will play a critical role in meeting the emissions reduction target. There is, however, great uncertainty associated with the achievable levels of heat decarbonisation and the optimal heat technology mix, which can have serious implications for the future electricity and gas demand. This work employs an integrated gas, electricity and heat supply model to quantify the impacts of heat decarbonisation pathways on the future electricity and gas demand. A case study in the Great Britain is performed considering two heat decarbonisation scenarios in 2050: one is the predominantly electrified heat supply and the other is the predominantly hydrogen-based heat supply. The electricity demand becomes more volatile in the electrified heat scenario as the peak surges to 107.3 GW compared to 51.1 GW in the 2018 reference scenario, while the peak in hydrogen-based heat scenario is 78.4 GW. The peak gas demand declines from 247.6 GW for 2018 to 81.7 GW for electrified heat scenario and to 85.1 GW for hydrogen-based heat scenario, confirming that the seasonality associated with heat demand is shifting away from the gas network and towards electricity network. Moreover, a sensitivity analysis shows that the future electricity demand is highly sensitive to parameters such as relative heat demand, coefficient of performance of air source heat pumps and share of electricity in hydrogen production. Finally, the application of a load shifting strategy demonstrates that demand-side flexibility has the potential to maintain the electricity system balance and minimise the generation and network infrastructure requirements arising from heat electrification. While the case study presented in this paper is based on the Great Britain, the findings regarding the future electricity and gas demand are relevant for the global energy transition. • Integrated operation of gas, electricity and heat supply systems is modelled. • Impacts of heat decarbonisation on GB electricity and gas demand are quantified. • Sensitivity of future electricity demand to input uncertainties is investigated. • Role of flexibility in maintaining the electricity balance is demonstrated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper we develop fundamental quantile regression models for the UK electricity price in each trading period. Intraday properties of price risk, as represented by the predictive distribution rather than expected values, have previously not been fully analyzed. The sample covers half hourly data from 2005 to 2012. From our analysis we are able to show how the sensitivity towards different fundamental factors changes across quantiles and time of day. In the UK the supply of electricity is to a large extent generated from coal and gas plants, thus the price of gas and coal, as well as the carbon emission price, are included as fundamental factors in our model. We also include the electricity price lagged by one day, as well as demand and margin forecasts. We find that the sensitivities vary across the price distribution. Our findings also suggest that the sensitivity to fundamental factors exhibit intraday variation. We find that the sensitivity to gas relative to coal is higher in high quantiles and lower in low quantiles, as well as some indications of market power being exercised during peak hours. We have demonstrated a scenario analysis based on the quantile regression models, showing how changes in the values of the fundamentals influence the electricity price distribution. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]