Development of concepts for cost-optimal nearly zero-energy buildings for the industrial steel building sector

According to the EU directive stipulating the NZEB standard, NZEBs have to be cost-optimal. Thus, the focus of this work was on developing cost-optimal solutions to meet the NZEB standard. The results are building concepts for warehouses and production buildings that have 50-75% lower heat energy demand than current (2015) building standards in Germany. These heat energy savings are primarily achieved by increased air tightness, decreased thermal bridges, optimized floor slab insulation and solar optimization. Significantly increased insulation thicknesses are only cost-effective for industrial buildings with low internal gains but relatively high interior temperatures. Previous standards almost exclusively concentrated on increasing the thermal insulation, while the other parameters were often neglected.