Association for Public Policy Analysis & Management

Urban areas including mega-scale cities have vigorously put efforts to be de-carbonized as well as to achieve urban energy sustainability. However, building sector in cities is still one of the major contributors to greenhouse gas emission and to annual end-use energy consumption. Capturing an importance of building’s efficient energy system to pursue emission reduction goal and make reliable urban energy sustainability, not only technical advance in energy efficiency but policy mandates are also critical to increase building energy efficiency. In this sense, this paper investigates how policies impact on energy efficiency in buildings by conducting scenario analysis. City of Seoul in South Korea is selected for case study area. Building sector accounts for more than half of total Seoul energy consumption. The Seoul Metropolitan Government has already reinforced building’s design criteria and introduced green building policies. For example, building retrofit program in Seoul has encouraged retrofitting of government and commercial buildings to reduce energy reduction. Based on the scenario analysis of a selection of policies, this paper provides suggestions for urban decision-makers to consider adopting building energy efficiency principles to achieve urban energy sustainability.