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• The effects of green roofs and practical green façades within courtyard area on public buildings investigated for "Hot Summer, cold Winter" region of China. • Internal surface temperatures for areas with and without external greening monitored and compared. • Heating and cooling energy consumption before and after greening compared from computer simulation as well as from smart meter readings. • Actual heating and cooling energy consumption before and after greening compared using statistical analyses. T -statistics and p -values show significant reductions were achieved. The "Hot Summer Cold Winter" climate region of China is one of the most challenging regions for providing occupant comfort in buildings, with high demands for heating as well as cooling, together with high humidity levels. Although the performance of buildings has improved with the implementation of the new Chinese National Building Standards for the Zhejiang Province, it is believed that adding passive strategies could help to alleviate the problem even further. This paper aims to investigate the effects of adding horizontal greening (green roof) and vertical greening in the courtyard area to existing public buildings in the "Hot Summer Cold Winter" climate region of China. Using computer simulation and measurements from a monitored case in the city of Ningbo, the effects of green retrofitting on human comfort and energy consumption are analysed. Simulation results suggest that with partial horizontal and vertical greening, the cooling load could be reduced by 8.8% and heating load by 1.85%. Comparisons between actual energy use before and after greening on the case building showed significant reductions in both winter and summer, confirming the positive effects of vertical and horizontal greening of public buildings in this region. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Highlights • Data on the Sina Weibo platform was used to analyze public's attitude toward green buildings. • Web crawler technology was applied to collect public's comments on Weibo posts related to green buildings. • Text mining method was used to evaluate public's sentiment toward green buildings. Abstract Energy conservation and consumption reduction in the field of construction are the keys to achieving the target global temperature growth of the Paris Agreement. However, the current promotion of green buildings is still stuck in the rut of government excessive intervention, market less participation. In order to explore the status of the Chinese public's attention, changing trends, sentiment orientation, and focus toward green buildings, this paper collected and analyzed information of Weibo users and posts and comments of popular posts related to green buildings. We used the Sina Weibo platform with web crawler technology and a text mining method. The results showed that: the public's attention toward green buildings has enhanced significantly with the change of government governance ideas, but still needs to be improved. Although vertical greening houses possess good heat preservation and thermal insulation, 46.32% of the Chinese public has negative sentiments toward vertical greening houses mainly due to worries about the increase in snakes, and mosquitoes and other insects caused by the increased vegetation cover. Price is not the main reason why the public has negative sentiments toward vertical greening houses. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: The energy consumption in the building sector in China shares 25% of total energy consumption in the whole nation. The energy use in urban buildings in Chinese cities like Beijing and Shanghai share approximately 90% of whole energy consumption in buildings. Amongst these urban buildings, the energy use in public buildings is higher than other building sectors. So, the public building sector thus is an area of priority with regard to energy conservation and carbon reduction. China''s Ministry of Construction has issued six energy-efficiency design standards to the building sector since 1995. The latest one is the design standards for energy efficiency in public buildings which aim to achieve 50% of the reduction of energy consumption in new and refurbished public buildings. Beijing and Shanghai governments have also issued their local energy saving standards for the public buildings with 65% and 50% of energy-saving goals. The main problems and weaknesses existing in the national and local standards in Beijing and Shanghai are assessed, and the reasons for producing the barriers to the implementation of national and two local standards are explored in this paper, they include: a) no explicit definitions of the base load energy consumption and the space conditioning energy uses are given, and only the energy savings from the base load energy consumption is considered in current standards; b) the benchmark of energy consumption selected is unreasonable and energy cuts from non technical measures are ignored; and c) the lack of effective supervision. Relevant solutions and suggestions to tackle these problems and weaknesses for the long-term energy conservation development in public buildings are discussed in this paper. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: This paper takes a close look at the China national standard GB50189-2005, Design Standard for Energy Efficiency of Public Buildings, which was enforced on July 1, 2005. The paper first reviews the standard, then compares the standard with ASHRAE Standard 90.1-2004 to identify discrepancies in code coverage and stringency, and recommends some energy conservation measures that can be evaluated in the design of public buildings to achieve energy savings beyond the standard. The paper also highlights several important features of 90.1-2004 that may be considered as additions to the GB50189-2005 standard during the next revision. At the end the paper summarizes the latest developments in building energy standards and rating systems in China and the US. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

In order to investigate the status of energy consumptions of the large public buildings in Jinan city, some large comprehensive office building was chosen as an example for evaluation in the paper. By the on-site survey, field measurements, the consumption indexes of water, gas, heating, electricity power and the primary energy were given out. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Emission reduction in buildings is essential to combat climate change. However, current strategies failed to balance development and emissions reduction goals. This paper selects a public building in China and simulates its initial energy consumption and carbon emissions. Then it establishes a multi-objective optimization model to explore cost-effective and emission-reduction strategies, considering photovoltaic and ground-source-heat-pump (GSHP) systems. Finally, NSGA-Ⅱ is used to solve, and sensitivity analysis is carried out. Results show that: (1) Energy consumed by the air conditioning system is the largest in January for heating and in July for cooling, validating the accuracy of the energy simulation model. (2) Economic efficiency and emission reduction effect are better when photovoltaic and GSHP systems are implemented simultaneously. (3) Electricity price, initial investment cost, annual solar peak hours, and the proportion of shallow geothermal energy significantly impact carbon emissions and cost. (4) The photovoltaic and power grid substitution ratio will exceed 8% every five years, and all substitutions will be completed in 2050. After adopting the GSHP system, the complete replacement will be advanced to 2045. Setting subsidies significantly shortens the payback period of investment and ensures firms' economic benefits. In summary, using photovoltaic and shallow geothermal energy is conducive to reducing emissions and saving costs in the long term. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The development of green building in China has reached a new stage, needs to turn to the total energy consumption control from the technology control [1] . We should avoid packing technologies in green building projects and regard achieving good environmental performance as the fundamental goal. In this paper, we use the method of post-occupancy evaluation and regard the building environmental performance as the core of the evaluation system, in order to reduce the influence on the accuracy of results from the measures evaluation. We establish the evaluation index system of green public building environmental performance in severe cold and cold regions, including the index of building life-cycle carbon emissions accounting. And we set up the application plan of index and the scoring method, then we put forward a kind of evaluation grade based on environmental performance level, finally proposed the POE System of Green Public Building Environmental Performance in Severe Cold and Cold Regions (POE-GPBEPC). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: In a capitalist society, public buildings are essential social assets that balance private and civic interests while providing convenience and comfort for the entire community. The performance of public buildings is remarkable as they are related to most people instead of a handful of users/owners in the private sector. Hence, architecture of public institutions occupies a central, subtle, and decisive role in the quality and the state of civility in the city. Living in compact environments, Hong Kong people always need and aspire for more acute use of public spaces. In this local context, common space and public buildings naturally form an extension to city living. As a consequence, public buildings are becoming multi-use, multi-value and multi-level. This article is a short account of the evolution and development of the public building in Hong Kong, from the early1960s to the new millennium. It considers the historic background of the modernist movement and the socio-economic setting of the city. In chronological order, the paper delineates six examples: the City Hall (1962), Town Hall in Shatin New Town (1985), Cultural Centre (1989), Heritage Museum (2000), Central Library (2001) and Wetland Park (2006). The authors present the statistical analysis of public buildings during this period and examine the cases with established criteria of public/civic buildings. Furthermore, social background and the strategies that those designs adopted are discovered and discussed. While generally following the modernist principles, the government architects in Hong Kong adopted alternative methods to respond to the increasing societal expectations along the timeline, for example, pragmatism, neo-classicism and sustainability. It concludes by suggesting the future of the city''s public buildings in the West Kowloon Cultural District in the coming decade. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: This paper aims to investigate the effects of retrofitting existing public buildings in the “Hot Summer Cold Winter” climate region of China, using simulation and a case study, to see how retrofitted public buildings perform in the face of climate change in the region. This area of China is one of the most challenging regions for providing occupant comfort in buildings, with high demands for heating as well as cooling, together with high humidity levels. The simulation results suggest that energy reduction of up to 40% with improvements to the building enclosure is possible by retrofitting current existing public buildings to the new Chinese National Standard for the Zhejiang Province. Requirements for combating possible increase in energy consumption from heating and cooling demands due to future climate change was also investigated, and it was found that by simply improving U-Values of the building envelope to the new national standards set for the Zhejiang Province, the effects of future climate change can be nullified up to the 2080s. Further improvements to having similar standards as developed countries such as England and Wales will have less significance and cannot nullify the effects of climate change from the newly retrofitted public buildings. However, this can be achieved by involving other energy-saving strategies and installing suitable energy-saving technologies for the region. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: Hainan province is the only tropical and island province in China, with the unique climatic and geographical features. It has a different energy performance in public buildings from those in the inland areas. This paper investigated the current situation of energy consumption of the sampled public buildings, including 26 hotels, 24 office buildings and 7 department stores, through analyzing utility billing data, on-site survey and measurement, and site operational records. The breakdowns of energy consumption found out that the electricity dominated the energy consumption for all the sampled buildings and the air conditioning system played a key role in the energy consumption of major building services. By analyzing the main factors for building energy consumption, the annual average energy use indexes were calculated to be 141.63kWh/m2, 87.70kWh/m2, and 166.95kWh/m2 for hotels, office buildings and department stores, respectively. Besides, the comparison between Hainan province and other areas revealed that the building energy consumption of this tropical province was at a low level. Because indoor environment quality can influence the health and work efficiency of humans in buildings, field tests on the indoor environment quality were also carried out, and the performance of indoor environment quality was rated. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: Carbon Crystal Panel (CCP) system, a new type of electric-heating system material based on the mechanism that nano carbon crystal sends out quantity of heat when it is electrified, enjoys lots of advantages, such as good controllability, cleanness during using, and high thermal response-speed. Compared with experimental data, the validity of mathematical physical model of the indoor CCP system is verified. According to the occupied feature of office rooms in southern cities of China, partial-heating program of CCP system is put forward and its indoor temperature field is simulated. The result shows, under the partial-heating condition, the temperature in localized working region comes up to the indoor designed temperature; the partial-heating program achieves the effect of energy-conservation. This paper provides technical support for the application of CCP system in public buildings. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: Indoor environment quality is simultaneously determined by thermal, acoustic, and luminous environments and air quality. This paper reports the findings of field studies conducted in public buildings in Beijing and Shanghai in 2008 and 2009. The studies included measurements of indoor environmental parameters such as air temperature, mean radiant temperature, relative humidity, air velocity, CO2 concentration, illumination intensity, and A-weighted sound pressure levels, as well as investigations of the occupants’ satisfaction with these indoor environments. A predictive model for evaluating overall satisfaction with the indoor environment was developed based on the analysis of the relationship between occupants’ satisfaction and the different environmental parameters. This model can provide a valuable reference for building designers as they compare different schemes by helping them choose designs favored by most people. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: Solar energy is receiving much more attention in building energy systems in recent years. Solar thermal utilization should be based on integration of solar collectors into buildings. The facades of buildings can be important solar collectors, and, therefore, become multifunctional. In addition, solar collectors can be used to enhance the appearance of the facade when considering their aesthetic compatibility. Currently, installation of collectors on the south tilted roofs, south walls, balconies or awnings of buildings are the feasible approaches for integration of solar collectors into buildings. The most well known solar energy demonstration projects in China are introduced in this paper, which cover different integrated approaches, and solar heating and cooling systems. In China''s cities, the process of rebuilding apartment roofs from flat to inclined offers the ideal opportunity to carry out solar renovation in combination with roof-integrated collectors. It can be seen from the demonstration projects over the last twenty years, that, solar cooling systems were mainly used in public buildings for either absorption or adsorption. Besides, nearly all solar cooling systems are multifunctional. They have been used to supply heating and hot water in other seasons for the purpose of high solar fraction. In the 11th Five-year research project (duration 2006–2010), the government has encouraged solar energy researchers to study, develop, and break through the key technologies involved in the integration of solar thermal technologies with buildings. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: The purpose of this research is to find a statistical methodology to investigate the national energy consumption in the public buildings sector in China, in order to look into the actuality of the national energy consumption of public buildings and to provide abundant data for building energy efficiency work. The frame of a national statistical system of energy consumption for public buildings is presented in this paper. The statistical index system of energy consumption is constituted, which refers to the general characteristics of public buildings, their possession and utilization of energy consumption equipment and their energy consumption quantities. Sequentially, a set of statistical report forms is designed to investigate the energy consumption of cities, provinces and the country, respectively. On this base, the above statistical methodology is used to gather statistics of a public building for annual energy consumption. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

China is committed to peaking its carbon emissions by 2030 and become a carbon-neutral society by 2060. The building sector that accounts for over one-third of the total carbon emissions is expected to face a great challenge in helping China achieve this goal. Shenzhen, as a low-carbon pilot city, whether its low-carbon work of urban buildings reaches the target is crucial. An attempt has been made in this study to assess the intensity of carbon emissions and associated reduction efficiency of urban buildings (operation stage) in Shenzhen by using the life cycle assessment method. The results show that the total carbon emissions generated from the buildings' operation stage have increased from 22 million metric tons (Mt) CO 2 eq in 2005 to 42 (±13%) Mt. CO 2 eq in 2019. Carbon emissions mainly result from the buildings' electricity use (79%), followed by refrigerant release emissions (12%). The energy conservation and carbon emissions reduction intensity in Shenzhen is at the middle level in China, and there is considerable space for improvement. According to scenario-based analysis, the carbon emission of the buildings sector can probably reach its peak by 2025 with the implementation of suitable policies – 5 years earlier than national target by 2030. Overall, this study makes a systemic analysis of the characteristics of urban buildings energy consumption and carbon emissions reduction, which can provide supportings for justifying the effectiveness of low-carbon activities in Shenzhen and beyond. • This paper evaluated the emissions reduction of civil buildings in Shenzhen city. • LCA method is employed to quantify the efficiency of emissions reduction. • Public buildings consume more energy per unit area than residential buildings. • Electricity use is the focus of buildings emission, accounting for 79% of the total. • Current efforts cannot meet the ambitious carbon peak and neutrality target. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• The airtightness of three typical zones of public buildings was tested. • Their air infiltration rates for 1800 cases were simulated. • The influence of air infiltration on public buildings was analyzed. Air infiltration of the building is closely related to its indoor thermal environment, indoor air quality and energy consumption. It is known that, there have been only a few studies focusing on the prediction of air infiltration rate in public buildings in the cold area of China. In this paper, the airtightness of three typical zones of public buildings was tested and their air infiltration rates for 1800 cases were simulated based on the test results. Field tests show that the air change rates under the pressure difference of 50 Pa of the three zones are 3.8 h−1, 4.4 h-1, and 5.2 h−1, respectively. The airtightness of the zones built later (2007) is even worse than that built much earlier (1990). Simulations show that the air infiltration rate ranges from 0.01 h−1 to 0.23 h−1 with an average of 0.09 h−1 for zone 1, from 0.03 h−1 to 0.87 h−1 with an average of 0.37 h−1 for zone 2, and from 0.05 h−1 to 1.05 h−1 with an average of 0.50 h−1 for zone 3, respectively. The frequency of the AIR of all the three zones presents a logarithmic normal distribution. Discussion shows that the impact of air infiltration on public buildings should be fully considered when designing the HVAC system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Energy Consumption monitoring technology (ECMT) can effectively reduce the energy consumption of public buildings (PB) in the operational phase, but it is not used widely in China. The main reason for this is that the existing policies have a poor effect on diffusing ECMT; thus, studying the impact of different policy instruments on ECMT in PB is of great significance to the widespread use of ECMT and its role in decreasing the energy consumption of PB. This paper systematically reviews the policy related to ECMT in China from 1990 to 2018, and, on this basis, divides the promotion stage of China's ECMT into three stages: the concept stage, the demonstration stage and the gradual promotion stage. A questionnaire survey and semi-structured interview of 313 stakeholders (ECMT suppliers, government officials, and scholars) was used to study the influence of command-and-control instruments (CAC), economic incentive instruments (EI) and exhortatory instruments (EXI) on the diffusion of ECMT in PB. The empirical results show that CAC and EXI contribute to the diffusion of ECMT in PB, whereas EI do not. In more detail, laws and regulations, energy consumption quotes, education and information programs, and energy audits and disclosure also have a significant impact on diffusing ECMT, whereas technical standards, subsidies for adopting ECMT, energy performance contracting, and carbon trading do not. Finally, relevant policies and suggestions are put forward based on the results. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]