城市形态对美国住宅能源使用的影响

The Impact of Urban Form on the U.S. Residential Energy Use

城市形态对交通能源使用影响的研究已相当广泛,但其对住宅能源使用影响的研究仍然缺乏。本文提出的概念框架通过三大因果途径将城市形态和住宅能源使用联系起来:输配电损失、不同住宅存量的能源需求、城市热岛导致的建筑供暖和制冷需求。其中两大因果途径可利用现有国家层面的数据进行分析。在排除其他因素影响的情况下,相对于紧凑型地区的同类居民,蔓延型地区的居民有更大可能性选择独户独立式住宅,且更倾向于大户型住宅,这都会导致住宅能源消耗量偏高。由于城市存在热岛效应,全国范围内蔓延型地区居民的住宅额外能耗平均值比紧凑型地区更低。本文还探讨了上述问题对城市规划的启示。

While the impact of urban form on transportation energy use has been studied extensively, its impact on residential energy use has not. This article presents a conceptual framework linking urban form to residential energy use via three causal pathways： electric transmission and distribution losses, energy requirements of different housing stocks, and space heating and cooling requirements associated with urban heat island. Two of the three can be analyzed with available national data. After we control for other influences, residents of sprawling counties are more likely to live in single-family detached houses than otherwise comparable residents of compact counties and also more likely to live in big houses. Both lead to higher residential energy use. Because of the urban heat island effect, residents of sprawling counties across the nation on average pay a small residential energy penalty relative to residents of compact counties. Implications for urban planning are explored.