Publications of Boza-Kiss, B.

Bottom-up assessment of potentials and costs of CO2 emission mitigation in the buildings sector: Insights into the missing elements

The Fourth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has calculated and shown that, currently, the buildings sector has the largest potential for low-cost carbon dioxide (CO2) mitigation in the short to medium term from application of technological options among the sectors examined, based on bottoms'up studies. The potential estimates, however, were derived with no regard to indirect costs of CO2 mitigation, associated benefits, and non-technological options; these factors might change the magnitude of the potential and the costs associated with its implementation. The question emerges how accurate the indicators of the economic potential are according to the current IPCC method and how much they might change if all factors mentioned were taken into account. While research results are presently not sufficient to fully answer this question and quantitative analyses of non-technological options, transaction costs associated with barriers, and non-energy benefits are scarce and fragmented, this paper makes a first attempt to assess the presently available literature in the field. The paper concludes that the ballpark is right for the figures reporting the cost-effective potentials in the buildings sector; however, these assessments indeed need to be corrected by incurred transaction costs and co-benefits relevant for the particular assessment, as well as the potential of non-technological options. The paper also outlines a research agenda in the area so that a possible next Assessment Report of the IPCC can derive a more accurate estimate of the bottom-up potential of CO2 mitigation. © Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2009.

Analysis of electricity consumption in the tertiary sector of Hungary

The tertiary sector, which is responsible for about a third of the total national electricity consumption,could be a significant contributor to energy saving and greenhouse gas mitigation targets in Hungary. For evidence-based design of such policies, it is important to understand the reasons behind the dynamics of the electricity consumption and its structure. According to the authors’ investigation, there has been no research-focused, targeted project aimed at electricity monitoring in tertiary sectorbuildings in Hungary as of 2006. To address this gap in knowledge, a research team at the Central European University (CEU) analyzed electricity consumption in 10 tertiary buildings in Hungary in the framework of the European project El-Tertiary (Monitoring Electricity Consumption in the Tertiary Sector). The methods used by CEU included a minimum of 2-weeks on-site measurements of lighting, major electrical appliances such as office equipment, kitchen appliances, heating, ventilation and air-conditioning (HVAC), as well as analysis of documents such as energy bills, electricity plans and energy supply contracts. In addition, a survey was conducted among the building managers. The paper details the preliminary results of the project implementation in Hungary. It investigates the electricity consumption and its composition in a set of studied buildings. It also identifies the opportunities for potential technical and behavioural electricity savings and the reasons why they are neglected by building owners or occupiers in Hungary. The results indicate significant potential for energy savings in tertiary sector buildings in Hungary. However, energy consumption is not a high priority among tertiary sector building owners and occupiers in the tertiary sector in Hungary and even the most low-hanging fruits for reducing energy consumption are often not picked up. Instead, renovations and new constructions of educational sector buildings often lead to an increase in energy consumption because more new appliances are purcha sed. Although the modern schools possessed more efficient electronic equipment, including liquid crystal display (LCD) monitors and florescent tubes and compact fluorescent lamps (CFLs), they were also characterized by the highest energy consumption due to the elevated number of computers and office equipment, as well as additional comfort elements, such as air conditioning and vending machines.