Evaluating the Potential for High -Performance Educational Buildings Designed to Become Net- Zero Energy Building

Motivation: Educational buildings represent the third main building sector with an average site energy intensity of 79.3kBtu/ft 2˙yr and total energy expenditure of ;Method: In this study, in order to evaluate the possibility of achieving the NZE goal, three high-performance design educational buildings with similar functionality, design features and sustainability ratings has been studied in order to understand their performance in regards to energy consumption, generation and associated Life Cycle Cost (LCC) in the operation phase. After initial assessment of each building base case through energy simulation, alternative retrofit scenarios has been applied to assess their potential to become NZEB. In addition to initial NZE potential evaluation, sensitivity analysis has been applied on the energy consumption and generation features with consideration of time value of money (net-present value) to highlight the most important risks impacting the fulfillment of NZEB standard in the long run. Then uncertainty analysis with the application of Monte Carlo simulation has been conducted on the most sensitive identified factors in their probability range (+/- Pr) to re-evaluate the potential of NZEB in the retrofit scenarios and during the operation phase of the building (≥ 25 years) with the consideration of performance and financial risks over time.;Innovation of Research: The combination of sensitivity analysis with uncertainty analysis on the building operation parameters to evaluate the potential of achieving a NZEB standard in the ≥ 25 years is an innovative part of this study in comparison to previous scholarly works.;Results: The results of this study identifies that probability distribution range for the energy consumption factors are in correlation with average building energy generation, while providing the optimum scenario to achieve the NZEB standard through the net-present value comparison with lower risk and higher confidence level after 25 years of operation. However, the isolated analysis of each parameter highlights the further research in the future to expand the impact of interdependencies among uncertain parameters on the fulfillment of NZEB standard. Finally, the learned lessons of this study are helpful to establish a set of best practices in the fulfillment of NZE standard in the future educational buildings considering the time-value of money.