Response of energy consumption for building heating to climatic change and variability in Tianjin City, China.

ABSTRACT The present paper concerns the impact of climate on building heating energy consumption for different types of energy in Tianjin, a large city in northern China. The results show that heating energy consumption is dominantly related to dry bulb temperature ( DBT), but the impacts vary with energy types and time scales (day, month or year). DBT can explain 97.7% of the coal consumption at different time scales and 83.0-89.7% of the natural gas consumption. DBT can also account for 25% of the daily and monthly heating electricity consumption and 89% of the annual heating electricity consumption. These results suggest that different measures for building energy conservation should be taken because of the differing climate impacts for different energy types. Especially, likely increase in temperature in the future should be considered to improve the energy efficiency of buildings. In addition, different models should be used to predict building energy consumption at different time scales. This would be helpful for energy policy makers and energy providers for adjusting energy use strategies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]