With a bit of help from my friends – the importance of networks

摘要

BeBo and BELOK are two national networks that serve asforums for property owners that strive for increased energyefficiency in the built environment. BeBo members are propertyowners of residential buildings, and BELOK members areproperty owners of commercial buildings. Both networks receivefunding from the Swedish Energy Agency. Their goalsare to:1.Strengthen relations between government, business andacademia2.Stimulate development of new viable technologies, systemsand methods for energy efficiency3.Disseminate, implement and create case studiesThe members of the BeBo and BELOK networks have sincetheir start developed tools and methods that increase members’awareness of energy efficient renovation and cost-benefit analysis.This paper aims to assess the impact of these two networks,specifically in terms of achieved energy efficiency. It will alsodiscuss to what extent members differ from a reference groupof non-member property owners in respect of carrying out energyefficiency measures.Data concerning total area, energy performance (kWh/m~2)and the rate of carried out energy-efficiency measures has beencollected from members of the two networks and from referencegroups. In order to assess the network’s current and futureimpact on the market as a whole, the degree to which energyefficiencymeasures have been implemented by the networks’members has been compared to the efforts made by the referencegroups and the effects that have taken place within the restof Swedish building sector.The results indicate that by 2013 BeBo had yielded a 0.5 percent decrease of thermal energy end-use in the Swedish residentialbuilding stock (equivalent to approximately 135 GWh/a).BELOK’s impact is even larger, by 2013 it had yielded approximatelya 2.3 per cent decreased use of thermal energy end-usein the Swedish non-residential building stock (equivalent to approximately430 GWh/a).1 By 2030 these effect are calculatedto have increased to 5 per cent (1,200 GWh/a) for BeBo andapproximately 11 per cent (1,650 GWh/a) for BELOK. This assessmentdemonstrates that networks have a substantial impacton achieved energy efficiency in Sweden.