Demand side management can add flexibility to a district heating (DH) system by balancing the customer’s hourly fluctuating heat demand. The aim of this study is to analyze how different demand side management control strategies, implemented into different customer segments, impact DH production. A city scale heat demand model is constructed from the hourly heat consumption data of different customer segments. This model is used to build several demand side management scenarios to examine the effect of them on both, the heat producer, and the customers. The simulations are run for three different-sized DH systems, representing typical DH systems in Finland, in order to understand how the demand side management implementations affect the production. The findings imply that the demand side management strategy must be built individually for each specific DH system; the changing consumption profiles of different customer segments should be taken into consideration. The results show that the value of demand side management for a DH companies remains low (less than 2% in cost savings), having an effect mostly upon the medium loads without any significant decrease in annual peak heat loads. Also, the findings reflect that the DH pricing models should be developed to make demand side management more attractive to DH customers.
This study aims to review empirical research concerning the impact of green certificates on property cash flows and values, particularly from professional property investors’ perspective. The study uses discounted cash flows (DCF), a widely used property valuation method in income-generating properties, as a methodological framework. In this study, over 70 peer-reviewed studies were identified, categorized, and analyzed in the DCF framework. The reviewed studies indicated that certificates might increase the rental income and decrease the operating expenses, vacancy, and risks of a property. Together with the brand value of certificates, these enhancements should lead to an increase in property value. The number of studies has grown rapidly during the 2010s. Lately, studies have developed from asset-level to portfolio-level examinations. Although the reviewed studies found certification to be beneficial, the range of reported benefits was wide, and over half of the studies concentrated on U.S. commercial real estate markets, with a strong focus on LEED and ENERGY STAR certificates. From a property valuation perspective, applying these results to other markets and certificates might be challenging. Property values that fully reflect the environmental performance of properties would be a key to motivate mainstream investors to adopt sustainable property features.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.