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The building energy performance gap is a critical obstacle to emissions reduction and energy conservation. Previous research mainly focused on identifying the factors contributing to the building energy performance gap (BEPG). Such studies have tended toward an inward-looking perspective that treats impact factors in isolation from one another. In reality, most factors are interrelated and associated with energy-related stakeholders. To address this research gap, this research developed a social network analysis model to investigate the underlying network of stakeholder-related influencing factors. According to nodal degree, status centrality, betweenness centrality, and brokerage roles, 21 factors and 14 links that substantially influence other factors directly or indirectly are identified. Six challenges, including "Challenges to knowledge and experience," "Challenges in determining who is responsible for BEPG among stakeholders," "Cost challenges," "Poor quality challenges," "Challenges to building operation management," and "Information integrity challenges," are further identified. Moreover, six strategies that are useful in controlling and eliminating influencing factors and interactions are proposed. The results show that, after the proposed strategies were conducted, the density and cohesion of the network are reduced by 48.28% and 11.62%, respectively, and the top ten betweenness centrality values for the nodes and links are reduced by at least 30%. This research is expected to aid not only researchers in better understanding the intricate interrelationships among the factors influencing BEPG but also practitioners in effectively controlling the influencing factors of BEPG. [Display omitted] • Influencing factors are situated closely in a dense network. • Factors related to designers and contractors considerably affect the network. • Communication helps to bridge the gap between diverse stakeholder groups. • Poor communication substantially affects adjacent factors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Energy-related stakeholders play a critical role in energy-saving and emission reduction. However, most previous studies focused on only a few stakeholders (e.g., occupant, designer and owner). Therefore, there is a lack of systematic analysis of energy-related stakeholders. Improving building energy efficiency requires the collaboration of all stakeholders in the building lifecycle. This study applies a two-mode social network model to investigate the stakeholders' power over the impact issues of building energy efficiency. Results show that all issues can be addressed by at least two stakeholders, thereby indicating the potential of collaboration in building energy management. Designers, manufacturers, commissioning agents and researchers are the most influential stakeholders with the highest degree centrality, betweenness centrality and eigenvector centrality. Insufficient knowledge and experience, lack of information integrity and unclear responsibility are the most influential impact issues. With the density of interaction being 1.000, nine core stakeholders (i.e. owner, designer, contractor, subcontractor, supervisor, manufacturer, commissioning agent, energy manager and researcher) and four core issues (i.e. unclear responsibility, poor collaboration and communication, insufficient knowledge and experience, and lack of information integrity) have intensive relationships. The core stakeholders account for 75% of the total stakeholders, whereas the core issues account for 25% of the total issues. Moreover, five strategies that are useful in promoting collaboration are proposed and validated. After the proposed strategies are implemented, the density of the collaboration network increased from 1.242 to 2.652. This study is not only expected to help researchers in understanding the complex interrelationships between stakeholders and issues but also practitioners in promoting effective collaboration strategies. • Twelve energy-related stakeholder groups are identified. • Sixteen issues that contribute to building energy performance gap are identified. • All issues can be addressed by at least two stakeholder groups. • Seventy-five percent of stakeholders are identified in the core position. • Twenty-five percent of issues are identified in the core position. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]