A holistic and smart carbon footprint NUKOSI tool for calculating the economic efficiency, energy efficiency, and environmental impact of construction measures

Abstract

To implement economic strategies that consider the entire life cycle of a property, criteria such as sustainability, agility, usability, safety, time, and cost are crucial. The literature shows that real estate and facilities management researchers strive to develop agile and easy-to-use calculation methods to achieve CO2 reduction goals and better account for building life-cycle costs by choosing green and cost-effective solutions and strategies. However, few tools can address these issues by providing an integrated IT solution capable of assessing the life-cycle cost-effectiveness of construction measures through an easy and performant calculation model. For that reason, through a research project on cost-benefit simulation with partners from the University of Applied Sciences Mainz and the "LBB" (State Office for Real Estate and Construction), we developed NUKOSI, a model for calculating the life-cycle costs, energy efficiency, and the environmental impact of buildings in monetary terms. In this paper, we apply NUKOSI in a case study where we calculate and simulate life-cycle costs based on "User costs of buildings" (DIN 18960 2020-11, ISO 15686-5 2008 and assess environmental impact. "NUKOSI" is operationally used by the "LBB" as an IT solution and has been further tested, for example, in higher education, trade, real estate funds, housing, and faith-based institutions.