How might the building stock transition towards net zero? How big a change is achievable? What factors determine both the overall potential as well as the transition process?

This special issue explores how the building stock might transition towards net zero, and what key theoretical and practical factors are going to determine the overall potential and shape the transition process. Papers address both the technical and socio-economic questions around retrofit potential, exploring the drivers and barriers to greater uptake of retrofits, and how policy, knowledge-sharing and more concerted engagement between stakeholders could be used to improve the rate of uptake needed to meet the long-term emissions reduction targets.

Guest editors: Daniel Godoy-Shimizu and Philip Steadman

Despite a wide range of academic backgrounds, timeframes, geographical contexts, and types and scales of retrofits, common threads arise in this special issue. These include the need for consistent long-term policy, with a greater focus on public engagement and a collaborative approach across stakeholders, and increased provision of reliable, open, consistent advice based on trustworthy data.

Taken as a whole, these papers illustrate what a monumental task it will be to turn the long-term building retrofit goals from ambitious words into successful actions. Tripling energy retrofits and on-site renewables by 2030, as well as reducing demand and improving performance, will require increased collaboration across a wide range of institutions and disciplines. Given the scale of the task, the issues raised in this special issue will all need to be addressed, through research, policy and practice, in order to efficiently transition the global built environment towards net zero.

Urban stock models have primarily focused on evaluating the energy or emissions pathways towards net zero, often treating occupant behaviour using simple, fixed assumptions or rules. Instead, the challenges for research, policy and practice will be to engage with the complex dynamics that influence how building users choose to install retrofits, for example, or modelling how public engagement might work and change over time.

Table of Contents

Net-zero retrofit of the building stock [editorial]
D. Godoy-Shimizu & P. Steadman

Local area energy mapping approach for high-density heat pump deployment
R. Gupta, M. Gregg & C. Liu

HVAC characterisation of existing Canadian buildings for decarbonisation retrofit identification
J. Adebisi & J. J. McArthur

A systemic decision-making model for energy retrofits
C. Schünemann, M. Dshemuchadse & S. Scherbaum

Market transformations: gas conversion as a blueprint for net zero retrofit
A. Gillich

Beyond the building: governance challenges in social housing retrofit
H. Charles

Learning to sail a building: a people-first approach to retrofit
B. Bordass, R. Pender, K. Steele & A. Graham

A strategic niche management framework to scale deep energy retrofits
T. H. King & M. Jemtrud

Preserving buildings: emission reductions from circular economy strategies in Austria
N. Alaux, V. Kulmer, J. Vogel & A. Passer

Implementing and operating net zero buildings in South Africa
R. Terblanche, C. May & J. Steward