Monitoring of housing blocks in Zaragoza (Spain) to validate the energy savings calculation method for the renovation of nZEB dwellings

The European directives and objectives of the 2020 strategy and NextGen funds highlight the importance of rehabilitating urban environments. In this context, it is important to make available planning tools that evaluate the possible improvements in the energy efficiency of housing blocks, transforming them, in accordance with the established regulatory criteria, into nearly zero-energy buildings. Methods based on geographic information system (GIS) can be a great help in energy planning and constitutes a step forward from other proposals, due to its automation in the calculation process, and the possibility of replicating it for any city and the scale of analysis. Due to the potential of the method, the validation of GIS methods is very necessary. Our research empirically evaluates the reliability of one of these methods by monitoring a housing block built in Zaragoza (Spain). This was monitored for a year to evaluate the percentage of savings achieved after the energy renovation of the building according to nZEB parameters. The results indicate that the quality of the analyzed model is high. This research concludes that the method offers objective criteria when delimiting priority areas for energy improvement in the city and constitutes a planning tool of interest for different agents involved in renovation activities. (C) 2021 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier B.V.

Automated summary

This research evaluates the reliability of using geographic information system (GIS) methods for energy planning by monitoring a housing block in Zaragoza, Spain. The results indicate that the method offers objective criteria for determining priority areas for energy improvement in the city, making it a valuable planning tool for renovation activities.