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ID:
118831
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| Publication |
2013.
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| Summary/Abstract |
This article focuses on the impact of the discount rate on cost-benefit assessment of investment options for residential building efficiency. An integrated thermal modeling, life cycle costing approach is applied to an extensive sample of dominant house designs for Australian conditions. The relative significance of predicted thermal performance and the applied discount rate on the Present Value of energy savings from alternative investment scenarios is investigated. Costs and benefits are also evaluated at the economy-wide scale, including carbon pricing considerations, and for a test-case household faced with alternative investment options at the point of construction. The influence of the applied discount rate on produced cost-benefit calculations is investigated, as is the interaction between critical cost-benefit input parameters. Findings support that the discounting framework is the primary driver of difference in estimates about costs and benefits of higher standards of efficiency in the residential sector. Results demonstrate that agreement on a low discount rate based on sustainability principals would prioritise those projects with significant environmental benefits.
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| 2 |
ID:
097206
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| Publication |
2010.
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| Summary/Abstract |
In order to value the costs and benefits associated with improved space heating we analysed the Housing, Heating and Health Study, a randomised community trial involving installation of energy efficient and healthy heaters (heat pump, wood pellet burner or flued gas heater) in homes with basic insulation and poor heating, occupied by households which included a child with asthma. We compared the initial purchase and installation cost of heaters with changes in the number of visits to health professionals, time off work/school, caregiving, and pharmaceutical use for household members and changes in total household energy use and carbon emissions following the intervention. We used two scenarios to analyse the results over the predicted 12-year life-span of the heaters. The targeted approach (Scenario A - assuming high rates of household asthma throughout the period of analysis) produced enough health-related benefits to offset the cost of the heaters, and when total energy use and carbon emission savings were included in the analysis the ratio of benefits to costs was 1.09:1. The untargeted approach (Scenario B - assuming typical New Zealand asthma rates throughout the period of analysis) had a ratio of total benefits to costs of 0.31:1.
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