Energy and mass flows of housing: a model and example

The energy and mass flows required to sustain dwelling services can be established and quantified only within the framework of a stock and flow model of the total housing stock. This paper develops such a model to estimate the energy flows of a typical sub-population of New Zealand housing stock. The energy and mass flows of key building materials are estimated and the energy flows of alternative cladding systems are compared. The stock and flow model is driven by empirical schedules of mortality. A guide to estimating the mortality of housing stock is set out in the companion paper (Johnstone IM. Energy and mass flows of housing: estimating mortality. Building and Environment 2000;36(1):43–51).