Civil Engineering
The Department of Civil Engineering will be working alongside colleagues to assess and evaluate the retrofit measures taken and to prepare life cycle assessments of these measures, thereby evaluating the embodied energy performance.
Members
- Dr Buick Davison (lead)
- Dr Abigail Hathway
- Danielle Densley Tingley
UK Governments are committed to legally binding green house gas emission reduction targets and it is clearly important to know how well the retrofit measures installed perform.
In order to have a complete the full picture of how the retrofit measures work, it is essential to evaluate not only the thermal performance of retrofitted homes but also assess the environmental burden associated with the installation of the measures.
This requires that the installed measures are assessed over their projected life cycle and account be taken of the energy emissions associated with manufacture, transportation, installation, maintenance, repair and decommissioning.
By undertaking a thorough Life Cycle Analysis (LCA) of the retrofit measures installed in a range of properties it will be possible to determine which approaches have the best payback period by offsetting the installation energy costs against the improved (reduced) energy demands for the treated property.
In conjunction with the whole work package the investigator will prepare dissemination materials, and be involved in dissemination activities bring providing the full picture of whole life energy use due to residential retrofit.