Data Pubblicazione:

Analisi del consumo di energia e impronta carbonica di un edificio dell’Università di Milano-Bicocca

Punto di partenza per un rapporto sulla sostenibilità

C.Bellantoni, M. Cavallotti, R. Benocci - University of Milano-Bicocca
G. Magatti, M. Gualtieri, M. Camatin - Polaris Research Centre - University of Milano-Bicocca
M. Gualtieri - ENEA, Technical Unit for Technologies Development - Saluggia Research Centre

Questo studio è stato realizzato per fornire dati scientifici che consentano di prendere decisioni per una corretta gestione energetica di un edificio universitario, con l’obiettivo di ridurre rifiuti e consumo di energia e migliorare le performance ambientali (minori emissioni) ed economiche degli edifici dell’Università

Climate change is one of the major challenges facing both population and the environment. Greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, released into the atmosphere in ever rapidly growing volumes, are responsible for this change. The European Union defined the actions and the procedure that the EU member States must adopt to reduce the GHG emissions and counteract climate changes. The Directive 2009/29/EC, called “climate, energy, environment 20-20-20” aims to a 20% emission reduction by 2020, with 20% of energy produced from renewable sources.
The Carbon footprint (CF) is defined by JRC (2007) as the overall amount of carbon dioxide (CO2) and other GHG emissions (e.g., methane, laughing gas, etc.) associated with a product (goods or services) along its supply-chain.
CF is therefore a useful indicator to calculate the emission baseline for a system, to determine the priority for impact reduction and to monitor the improvement achieved by applying different procedures.
Although the importance of CF is recognized, no standardized procedure for its calculation is available, even the norm UNI EN ISO 14067, describing the procedure for products CF, is about to be published (ISO/CD 2012).
At present CF calculation refers to the Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) methodology regulated by ISO 14040-44 and it can be seen as an LCA analysis where results are expressed only in terms of “Global Warming Potential in 100 years” (GWP100) impact category, measured as equivalent amount of CO2 (eqCO2) emitted (Pernigotti, 2011).
ISO 14064 (GHG management and related activities, CEN 2006) and the British standard PAS 2050 (CF calculation for goods and services, British Standard Institution, 2011) are so far the only reference standard guidelines directly dealing with CF measurement.
Public Administrations (PA) are required to reduce their consumption of energy and Universities have to
contribute with specific plans or actions. The University of Milano-Bicocca has thus decided to start the evaluation of the CF of its buildings, after the stipulation of a voluntary agreement with the Ministry of the Environment, Land and Sea, which promotes projects aimed at analysing, reducing and neutralizing the impact of the University services on climate. Under this agreement, the University will adopt a methodology for calculating the CF on the consumption of electricity and thermal energy in their buildings. The project “Carbon Footprint of the University of Milan Bicocca” intends to evaluate the energy consumption in buildings, which plays an important role in CF calculation, particularly in the allocation of emissions of eqCO2 (GWP impacts in LCA-analysis) since electricity is produced mainly by fossil fuels. This is therefore the first analysis carried on within the University with the assessment of the energy consumption and related CF of the building U7, with a surface area of 27,891 m2. This analysis intends to create a model of investigation, applicable to the other University buildings. The U7 thermal energy comes entirely from the network of district heating and cooling and therefore its impact on the building CF has not been taken into account. A survey was conducted during the evaluation, in order to identify the categories of electricity used in the building. These data have been used to assign the eqCO2 emission to the identified categories and to propose energy saving strategies, so as to reduce the CF and the relative environmental impact.

Articolo tratto da Energia, Ambiente e Innovazione, rivista bimestrale dell’ENEA n. 3-4 maggio-agosto 2013