The effect of standardization of industries on life cycle embodied energy of residential buildings in Iran

In the present study, the effect of the laws and regulations of the Institute of Standards and Industrial Research of Iran (ISIRI) in four industry sectors including Steel and Iron, Tile, Ceramic, Cement, and Brick on the life cycle embodied energy of buildings was investigated. Globally, 20.1% of the total world annual final energy consumption is found in the building sector consists of residential and commercial users. Energy consumption in buildings is found in different forms, including the production of primary materials, their transportation to the building site, construction, operation, renovation, maintenance, and demolition. In this research, different solutions were considered, and hybrid input-output analysis was chosen as an effective method to find primary embodied energy in buildings. The embodied energy of four high-consuming sectors in Iran was substituted with input-output data to increase the reliability of the study. The embodied energy of the building in the present case study is 10.71 GJ/m2 in 25 years of usage. Using the laws and regulations of ISIRI in 2006, which reports the standard energy use in four main industries in Iran, the embodied energy is reduced to 9.15 GJ/m2 in 25 years of usage, which shows that a significant amount of energy (1911 GJ primary energy) and greenhouse gases (141.2 kg GHGs) could be saved in the case study’s building. Further data collection in other industry sectors like aluminum, glass, and paint will change the results and increase the reliability of the research.