Keynote Speech 4: Cooling is the new heating: NZ’s self-denial.

Abstract

As the climate warms, we use more electricity for cooling, causing more carbon emissions, causing the climate to warm further causing the use of more electricity for cooling and so on. This presentation looks at past and recent policies of energy efficiency for the cooling of buildings and asks the difficult questions of why it took almost 30 years to question our energy efficiency standards; why does NZ have some of the lowest energy efficiency standards in the OECD; why do we have no specific data on energy used for cooling in NZ; why do we have some of the highest electricity prices in OECD; why are households in fuel poverty subsidizing the cost of cooling commercial buildings? Why do current policies show little respect to our climate emergency?

Building Codes for Commercial Buildings Commercial buildings actual cooling demand New Zealand’s Institutions “Stifling Innovation” Why there is no cost incentive to improve standards for commercial buildings