Objectives, barriers and occasions for energy efficient refurbishment by private homeowners

By retrofitting their homes to meet stricter energy efficiency standards, private homeowners can reduce home energy use significantly, thus taking a significant step towards achieving a low carbon lifestyle. Although the adoption of low and zero carbon (LZC) technologies can play a key role in achieving significant reductions of CO2 emissions, current practices are rather disappointing. In Germany, for example, homeowners are moving very slowly when it comes to achieving significant reductions in personal energy use and carbon emissions. In many cases, the maintenance and repair activities being undertaken are those resulting in only subtle improvements in energy efficiency and far less than what would appear to be technically viable. With this in mind, we present the results from a standardized empirical survey of 1000 homeowners in Germany that focuses on homeowner maintenance and refurbishment decision-making. A comparison of homeowners applying LZC technologies vs. those carrying out standard refurbishment measures allows us to consider homeowner objectives and barriers to energy-efficient refurbishment and examine the critical role that the dissemination of information and transfer of knowledge play in achieving energy-efficient refurbishment measures. We further discuss the ways that stakeholder collaboration can improve energy efficiency knowledge transfers and enhance the willingness of private homeowners to adopt LZC technologies. (C) 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.