Policy Recommendations from IEA EBC Annex 80: Resilient Cooling of Buildings

International Energy Agency Energy in Buildings and Communities (IEA EBC) Annex 80: Resilient Cooling of Buildings promotes a rapid transition to the mainstream and preferred use of resilient low-energy and low-carbon cooling systems in buildings. Annex 80 Subtask D (Policy Actions) advances policy-related endeavors that support energy efficiency and resilience in cooling. The Subtask team analyzed product-labelling programs; air conditioning minimum energy performance standards (MEPS) and voluntary measures; and building regulations, standards, and compliance requirements, identifying policy gaps and opportunities. It then generated a set of 37 policy recommendations that boost resilience to heat waves and/or power grid failure by reducing heat gain, removing sensible heat, enhancing thermal comfort without mechanical cooling, or removing latent heat. Strategies addressed include advanced solar shading/advanced glazing, cool envelope materials, evaporative envelope surfaces, ventilated envelope surfaces, heat storage and release, ventilative cooling, adiabatic/evaporative cooling, compression refrigeration, high-temperature cooling systems using low-grade thermal energy, comfort ventilation, micro-cooling and personal comfort control, and whole-building solutions. Each recommendation identifies the mechanism(s) through which the policy would be applied and the disruption(s) mitigated; details the what, why, how, who, where, timeline, cost, and potential undesirable side effects of implementation; and suggests a policy model to follow.