Building life cycle analysis toward low carbon emission and energy efficiency

Abstract

The Malaysian construction industry contributes as an empowerment to the Malaysian economic sector. Even though, the building and construction industry are the key sector for country development, but still they are among the biggest threat to the environment in form of greenhouse gases (GHGs) emissions. The problem of massive emission of carbon dioxide (CO2) from the burning of fossil fuels and their climatic impact has become major scientific and political issues. Buildings construction consume huge amount of natural resources and emitted million tons of carbon emission. In fact, Malaysia is one of the top 30 countries for carbon emission in the world. The energy demand in Malaysia has increased dramatically for the last few years. Commercial sector is also responsible for a great amount of CO2 emissions from the energy consumptions. Therefore, one way of reducing energy consumption could be facilitated to the reduction of CO2 emissions in this sector. Actions need to be taken in order to promote sustainable buildings in terms of carbon emission and energy consumption which can lead to significant energy saving in the built environment. Using appropriate thermal insulation can reduce and causes a reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by reducing energy consumption. This paper presents an absolute estimation and quantification of embodied and operational carbon emission and investigates the total amount of energy consumption. Results shows that after implementation of sustainable solutions in the case study, operational energy consumption and carbon emission were reduced to a grate extend.