Framework for selecting occupancy-focused energy interventions in buildings

Energy policy tools aimed at achieving energy savings for buildings have often yielded less than the predicted savings. One reason for these results is that the design of these tools often neglects the actions and behaviours of the building occupants, and focuses more on the cost and ease of implementation. This research highlights the importance of identifying the diverse characteristics of occupants that significantly contribute to environmental problems, and the factors that make sustainable behavioural patterns attractive. A multilevel intervention strategy tailored to various occupants' characteristics to produce and maintain large-scale energy savings for buildings over time is proposed. To achieve this, the framework adopts a motivation/opportunity/ability (MOA) approach from the consumer and social marketing fields, where intervention strategies can be regarded as advertisements enticing the building occupants to adopt certain energy-use characteristics. The conceptual framework involves: measuring occupants' pre- and post-intervention exposure MOA level and energy-use profiles; clustering occupants based on identified characteristics; and accordingly choose energy-efficiency intervention strategies. The results of a case study of an actual building highlight the capabilities of the proposed framework in the selection of effective intervention strategies to achieve the required energy reductions.