Buy smaller houses to reduce energy consumption
By living in smaller and smarter houses in the future, we will be able to reduce our heating costs, argues Samer El Kari, Lecturer at the School of Engineering, Jönköping University. Photo: Unsplash/Thierry Lemaitre
Electricity prices are record high in Sweden, and a large part of the cost goes on heating your own home. To reduce energy consumption and our impact on the climate, it could therefore be an alternative to live in smaller homes, says Samer El Kari, Lecturer at the School of Engineering, Jönköping University.
Samer El Kari, Lecturer at the School of Engineering, Jönköping University.
Samer El Kari was recently interviewed by the radio station P4 Jönköping
External link, opens in new window. about how one can reduce heating costs by living in smaller and smarter houses in the future.
“There is a direct connection between the heating cost and the size of the home,” he said in the interview.
"The customer controls the development"
To Samer El Kari's knowledge, however, there is no large-scale investment in building smaller homes, even though there are a lot of enthusiasts who want to live compactly to reduce their ecological footprint on earth.
“As always, it is the customer who pays and thus controls the development. Money is the most significant driving force. With higher interest rates, I think you would have to build smaller houses," says Samer El Kari.
He speculates that in the future, we will be able to keep our energy consumption down through artificial intelligence, so that, for example, you can wash your clothes and run your dishwasher when the demand on the electricity grid is at its lowest and the electricity hours are the cheapest.
"It is all about information"
"Imagine a future with smart homes that can also communicate with each other and take into account supply and demand. It is all about information and how we handle that information so that it is useful to us in our energy management. Our standard of living requires a lot of electricity/energy. We must learn to use every kilowatt-hour produced in the best possible way," says Samer El Kari.
Rickard Zetterstedt, construction manager at the housing manufacturer Trivselhus in Vetlanda, who participated in the same radio feature , agrees with Samer El Kari.
“Large houses with large areas are more expensive to heat. Surface-efficient and slightly smaller houses are better in terms of energy consumption,” said Rickard Zetterstedt in the interview with P4 Jönköping.
The bar graph shows the energy overview for a smaller house during a year. According to Samer El Kari, all houses have a similar consumption pattern, that the bars increase with the cold temperature outdoors.
