Lumped-capacitance models to evaluate the urban cooling energy consumptions: analysis on a case-study district in the University of Padua

The growth of urban population and consumption has boosted research about Urban Building Energy Modelling (UBEM). This paper proposes an analysis of the cooling energy demand of a real district with a new UBEM platform, EUReCA (Energy Urban Resistance Capacitance Approach). EUReCA consists of a Python-based tool to predict cities' energy demand based on simplified physical models. The article compares the hourly temperature and humidity profiles to those calculated with EnergyPlus, used as a benchmark. Moreover, hourly and seasonal cooling demand are verified and peak load difference is highlighted. Finally, the effect of several retrofit actions on building envelopes and HVAC plants is discussed and compared to the current scenario.