Dynamic modeling of future climatic and technological trends on life cycle global warming impacts and occupant satisfaction in US office buildings

Dynamic modeling of building performance is essential for understanding how current buildings will respond to projected changes in environmental conditions, and how these responses will in turn affect building occupants. Additionally, expected shifts in background energy systems will change the carbon intensity of energy delivered to buildings, while shifts in atmospheric composition will alter the global warming potential of each greenhouse gas. This paper models these three dynamic systems simultaneously to determine which projected shifts will have the largest influence on global warming impacts and occupant satisfaction metrics throughout the use phase of an office building prototype model in different climate zones of the United States. The median of RCP8.5 and RCP4.5 climate scenarios were used to morph local weather files to simulate the electricity and natural gas needed to meet heating and cooling loads in each location, as well as thermal comfort and daylighting metrics. These RCPs were also used to estimate shifts in the global warming potential factors for CO2, CH4, and N2O. Projected shifts in the electricity generation mix and upgrades to transmissions and distribution infrastructure in each region were used to estimate future carbon intensity factors for building site energy use. Compared to the baseline results, decarbonization of the electricity grid results in the largest shift in building operational GHG emissions, far outweighing emissions increases due to higher cooling loads. Shifts in ambient temperatures and direct and diffuse radiation had heterogeneous effects on occupant comfort, particularly in Boston across different seasons and orientations. Understanding how building performance is expected to respond to complex future trends will assist in designing adaptive buildings that take advantage of projected changes.