Maximizing sustainability of existing buildings within limited upgrade budgets

Abstract

Existing buildings, especially aging ones, are currently in urgent need of upgrading to improve their performance and potentially achieve green certification. Building owners often need to identify and implement building upgrades that maximize the sustainability of their buildings as well as achieve green certification programs such as the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED). This paper presents the development of an optimization model that maximizes the number of earned LEED points for existing buildings within a specified upgrade budget. A case study of an existing building is used to demonstrate the use of the optimization model and illustrate its capabilities. This research presents new methodology for optimizing the selection of building upgrades to maximize the sustainability of existing buildings and achieve green certification within limited budgets. The present model is expected to support decision-makers, building owners and operators, building managers, and contractors to optimize the use of their upgrade budgets and maximize sustainability of their buildings.