Solar Energy Perspectives - IEA

Chapter 4: Buildings
South Africa, electric water heating accounts for one-third of the power consumption of the
average household. The government has identified the massive deployment of solar water
heaters as one effective option to avoid electricity shortages, and launched a programme to
install one million solar water heaters by 2014 (Photo 4.3). When large regions are compared,
China is the market leader not only in absolute terms but also on a per capita basis, followed
for the first time in 2009 by the Middle East.
Photo 4.3 Solar water heaters in South Africa
Source: Weiss, 2011.
Key point
Solar water heaters can help avoid electricity shortages in developing economics.
Energy efficient buildings and passive solar
The relative importance of the various sources of energy consumption in buildings varies by
region, climate, level of development and sector. In IEA member countries, most energy in
the building sector is used for space and water heating, while energy consumption for
cooling is generally modest. Even in the United States, with its mature air-conditioning
market, energy consumption for cooling is only around 8% of energy consumption in
residential buildings and 13% in commercial buildings. In France, a temperate European
country, space heating accounts for 70% of energy consumption in residential buildings,
sanitary hot water for about 10%, specific electricity consumption for 10% and cooking for
8%. In sunnier Spain, water heating represents one-third of the total demand for heat in
housing. On average, space heating alone represents half of the energy used in households,
down from 60% twenty years ago (Figure 4.2).
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© OECD/IEA, 2011