Impacts of climate change, population growth, and power sector decarbonization on urban building energy use

Chenghao Wang (), Jiyun Song, Dachuan Shi, Janet L. Reyna, Henry Horsey, Sarah Feron, Yuyu Zhou, Zutao Ouyang, Ying Li and Robert B. Jackson
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Chenghao Wang: Stanford University
Jiyun Song: The University of Hong Kong
Dachuan Shi: The University of Hong Kong
Janet L. Reyna: National Renewable Energy Laboratory
Henry Horsey: National Renewable Energy Laboratory
Sarah Feron: Universidad de Santiago de Chile
Yuyu Zhou: The University of Hong Kong
Zutao Ouyang: Stanford University
Ying Li: Engineering Research Center of Eco-environment in Three Gorges Reservoir Region
Robert B. Jackson: Stanford University

Nature Communications, 2023, vol. 14, issue 1, 1-16

Abstract: Abstract Climate, technologies, and socio-economic changes will influence future building energy use in cities. However, current low-resolution regional and state-level analyses are insufficient to reliably assist city-level decision-making. Here we estimate mid-century hourly building energy consumption in 277 U.S. urban areas using a bottom-up approach. The projected future climate change results in heterogeneous changes in energy use intensity (EUI) among urban areas, particularly under higher warming scenarios, with on average 10.1–37.7% increases in the frequency of peak building electricity EUI but over 110% increases in some cities. For each 1 °C of warming, the mean city-scale space-conditioning EUI experiences an average increase/decrease of ~14%/ ~ 10% for space cooling/heating. Heterogeneous city-scale building source energy use changes are primarily driven by population and power sector changes, on average ranging from –9% to 40% with consistent south–north gradients under different scenarios. Across the scenarios considered here, the changes in city-scale building source energy use, when averaged over all urban areas, are as follows: –2.5% to –2.0% due to climate change, 7.3% to 52.2% due to population growth, and –17.1% to –8.9% due to power sector decarbonization. Our findings underscore the necessity of considering intercity heterogeneity when developing sustainable and resilient urban energy systems.

Date: 2023
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DOI: 10.1038/s41467-023-41458-5

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