Lifestyle trends for heating and cooling in Maltese households

Abstract

According to the EU Directive 2009/28/EC Malta is obliged to reach a 10% renewable energy share of the total final energy consumption by the year 2020. Due to the challenging targets, Malta seems to be finding it hard to achieve the agreed trajectories. Renewable energy applications in an island state like Malta are hard to achieve due to various constraints, including: lack of space, multiple land-uses and land-use conflicts, few natural resources, low social acceptance, lack of financial resources, lack of expertise, and lack of capacity building. Hence, it would be more feasible to also focus on energy efficiency in buildings which is one of the major consumers of energy on the island. More than 30% of the energy production in Malta is used by buildings, including households. Primarily, this is where the authorities lack information, in the light of heating and cooling of air and water heating in buildings. This paper investigates the status-quo of existing lifestyle trends for space heating and cooling, and water heating, in Maltese households. The scope is to evaluate the potential of shifting to more energy efficient systems that can positively contribute towards the decline of energy consumption in houses, and thus indirectly help to attain the renewable energy targets set for year 2020 and beyond. Energy behaviour and attitudes of Maltese citizens have also been analysed.