Assessing the market for air conditioning systems in European buildings

This paper models the past and future sales, replacement rates and installed stock levels of air conditioning products in Europe. Established market diffusion models have been reformulated to allow their calibration against product sales data, and then used to estimate future and past sales levels, time-dependent product replacement rates and installed stock levels in each EU-27 country for each of the major energy-using air conditioning products. The results show that, for most air conditioning products, continuing growth of sales and stock is to be expected, albeit at lower rates than in previous years. Expressed in terms of kW cooling power, split-system room air conditioners and chillers continue to account for the majority of sales and stock, with variable refrigerant flow (VRF) systems taking an increasing share of first-time installations. The results provide fundamental information on which to base policy assessments (which are not part of this paper).

► Past and future sales, stock and replacement rates of European air conditioning. ► Estimates for each EU-27 country. ► Continuing growth of sales and stock is to be expected, albeit at reducing rates. ► Split-systems and chillers continue to account for most cooling with VRF growing.