SPR was commissioned to determine the extent to which renewable energy (primarily rooftop PV) is relied on to enable new commercial buildings to comply with energy performance requirements under the National Construction Code (NCC) – 2019 version – resulting in a trade-off of building energy efficiency.
In this project, SPR collaborated with 2XF Pty Ltd to conduct a survey and structured interviews with key stakeholders in the building sector, including professionals in; building performance simulation modelling, building services and HVAC engineering design and installation, solar PV design and installation, building design and architecture, and relevant industry associations. This research demonstrated that solar is widely used on new commercial buildings, with 58% of the designs sampled including solar, delivering on average 20% of the building’s simulated annual energy requirements. 8% of these designs utilised provisions under the JV3 Verification Method that allow renewable energy system output to offset under-achievement of NCC2019 energy performance requirements.