Behavioral Strategies to Bridge the Gap between Actual and Potential Energy Savings in Commercial Buildings

The Energy Efficiency Center, the Center for the Built Environment (U.C. Berkeley), Ghoulem Research, and other key researchers are collaborating on a project to better understand the behavioral and social dynamics of commercial building energy use. The “Occupants, Buildings, Operators, Energy” project (OBOE), funded by the California Air Resources Board (ARB), seeks to outline promising routes to lowered greenhouse gas emissions in California commercial buildings that do not require large technological investments. The project draws from occupant satisfaction assessment, post-occupancy evaluation, anthropology, sociology, and engineering.

Many commercial buildings do not operate as designed, occupants are often far less than content with the physical environment of their workplaces, and building facilities staff negotiate multiple “clients” often with limited data on energy use or equipment performance. Recognizing that commercial buildings are organizations – of occupants, building operators, facilities staff, managers, structures, equipment, software, and other aspects of the physical environment that in combination determine energy use – this project is designed to better discover the dynamics of energy use in commercial buildings, and to use this information to identify organizational strategies that reduce energy waste.

In addition to building occupant surveys, interviews with building operators, energy managers, and other facilities staff, and discussions with energy researchers, designers, and policy professionals, the project will carry out several in-depth building case studies. Potential case study buildings are currently being sought.

The project began in January 2011.

 

Project team:

U.C. Davis: Alan Meier, Kristin Heinemeier

U.C. Berkeley: John Goins

Ghoulem Research: Mithra Moezzi

Sustainable Design+Behavior: Christine Hammer

Lutzenhiser and Associates: Loren Lutzenhiser

 

For more information, or to offer a building for a possible case study, please contact:

Mithra Moezzi (Ghoulem Research) mithra.moezzi@ghoulemresearch.com

Alan Meier (UC Davis): akmeier@ucdavis.edu