Wang, C., Song, J., Shi, D. et al. Impacts of climate change, population growth, and power sector decarbonization on urban building energy use. Nat Commun

Objective:

• Quantify the city-scale building energy use for 277 urban areas across contiguous US in the mid-21st century, with a focus on assessing the impacts of climate change, population growth and power sector decarbonization

Case:

• US urban areas

Methodology:

• Bottom-up model: EnergyPlus
• Linear regression

Data Source

• High-granularity End-Use Load Profiles (EULP)
• Population
• Hourly weather data

Findings:

• The mean mid-century annual building E-EUI for space heating is projected to decrease by 13.5-21.2% when compared with the reference-decade level

• Fossil fuels, including natural gas, fuel oil, and propane, account for ~40% of the building energy use in contiguous US (CONUS) urban areas

• City-scale building E-EUI for cooling rises by 13.8%

Coding Reference:

• Matlab