Appropriate energy efficient building envelope technologies for social housing in the Irish climate

Extensive dynamic thermal simulation parametric analyses have been undertaken of energy efficient fabric alterations to social housing in Northern Ireland culminating in priorities for deployment. Five 'basecase' simulation models were used to represent the predominant characteristics of the existing social housing stock. The majority of technologies studied provided annual space-heating energy savings of more than 10%. The variation of energy savings and economic performance across the basecases highlights the value of a dwelling specific approach to selecting energy efficient building envelope technology solutions for energy rehabilitation programmes. The paper further outlines a framework for prioritising appropriate energy efficient building envelope technological solutions for a large regional building stock, i.e. existing social housing stock in Northern Ireland, highlighting influential parameters. An energy efficient building envelope inter-technology ranking approach provides a method of comparison across the various different dwellings in the regional housing stock. Airtightness ranked consistently highest across the dwellings studied with some solar technologies performing better than more technologically mature solutions such as insulation. © Springer Science+Business Media, Inc. 2006.