Electrical Energy Consumption, Energy Efficiency and Energy Conservation in Commercial Sector and “LEED” Certification

In USA, approx. 38% of all primary energy resources is used to produce electricity and almost 3/4^thof the total electricity is used by the residential and commercial sectors. In order to conserve energy, reduce the green-house gases, create a sustainable future and yet maintain a good quality of life, attention must be given to the energy use in the residential and commercial sectors. Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) certification of commercial (and residential) buildings is one such effort that has gained a lot of momentum in the architectural and energy conservation community. However, how this certification is connected to the big picture of energy and sustainability has not been addressed much in the literature. This paper discusses the LEED certification and its relevance to the big picture of electric energy usage.

I. Introduction and the Big Picture

Primary energy¹

Includes coal, gas, nuclear, conventional hydro, petroleum, etc.

consumptions of the world and the United States (US) in 2018 are 595 and 101 quadrillion Btu (or quads) respectively, compared to the world population of approximately 7.71 billion to the US population of about 327.2 million. The US uses approximately 17% of the total primary energy with 4.25% of the world population. The world energy consumption is growing steadily while the energy consumption of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) countries including the US is growing at a much slower (sometimes negative) rate [1]. According to the US Energy Information Administration (EIA), US primary energy usage has been essentially remained at around 98 quads for the past 10 years (101.2 quads in 2018) [2], Figure 1 shows the historical US primary energy usage and production from 1975–2017. While the energy production has increased slowly from about 62 to 87 quads over that time period, the energy consumption has grown rapidly from 1984, slowing down, and saturating at about 100 quads (or little lower) in recent years. The two main reasons of the increase are population growth (from 213 million to 326 million in USA) and increased energy usage related to the quality of life and defined by “Human Development Index (HDI)”. With the advancement of technologies including consumer electronics, household appliances, more home improvement accessories and air-conditioning, the overall electricity usage have been increasing (even though the per capita consumption has dropped in recent years). The reason for slower growth (or slightly negative growth) in recent years could be attributed to economic instability, cost of electricity, energy conservation and improved energy efficiency. Figure 1.

U.s. Primary energy usage and production [3]