POST-OCCUPANCY EVALUATION FOR RESIDENTIAL BUILDINGS IN THE EU (Case Study: Italy-Finland)

Building retrofitting is generally considered a better alternative to demolition when it comes to upgrading and improving buildings' performance since constructing buildings from scratch emits much more embodied carbon. Retrofitting options and solutions are based on research studies conducted in laboratories, simulation programs, and the most current technologies. Architects and engineers tend to use the available techniques, tools, and materials universally across a range of buildings, climate zones and occupants, but other factors, including building location, orientation, area, design, occupant behaviour, etc., may have a significant impact on building performance. When these other factors are ignored, building refurbishment may fail to meet occupants' needs and comfort. This may result in unexpected performance that is neither desirable nor necessary regarding energy consumption, indoor environment quality, occupant satisfaction, and indoor health and well-being conditions. Residential buildings with a wide range of types; detached, semi-detached, terraced houses and flats of different ages representing different types of inefficient construction in terms of energy demand with varying user occupancy patterns and activities provide a challenge for the energy manager. The need to study and evaluate the performance of residential buildings is because there is a lack of evidence about how advanced systems can be used for upgrading residential buildings, as well as a discrepancy, observed between actual and predicted solutions for current retrofitted buildings in the European Union. The research utilizes post-occupancy evaluation (POE) of retrofitted residential buildings as a technique that can assist in evaluating buildings’ indoor environmental quality (IEQ) performance, people’s satisfaction with IEQ, and their health and well- being conditions. This study aims to achieve its objective through a literature review of the topic, in addition to two field studies conducted in Italy and Finland.