CEU Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2025
| Author | Konik, Kamila |
|---|---|
| Title | Building(s') Energy Independence: Modelling Energy Self-Sufficiency in Polish Homes by 2050 |
| Summary | This study investigates the extent to which single-family buildings in Poland could become energy self-sufficient (meeting real-time demand with on-site generation) by 2050 through retrofitting, rooftop photovoltaics (PV), and battery storage. It fills a key research gap by quantifying the potential and implications of large-scale household energy self-sufficiency for decarbonisation, energy security, resilience, and citizen empowerment. The research simulates hourly energy flows for two retrofit scenarios in five representative buildings with different energy performance levels, each equipped with the same PV+battery system. Results show that annual self-sufficiency ranges from 42% in the least efficient homes to 77% in the most efficient buildings, with an aggregated national self-sufficiency level of 64.4%. Deep retrofits amplify the impact of solar and storage, as for the same PV installation and battery, a highly efficient home achieves far greater autonomy than an inefficient one. Findings highlight the importance of coupling renewable generation with efficiency improvements, but also battery storage, as in PV-only systems, every 1000 kWh/year reduction in demand per building increases self-sufficiency by around 2 percentage points, whereas the addition of battery storage disproportionately benefits more efficient buildings, amplifying gains by up to 6.7 percentage points. Adding a battery improves self-consumption by around 21–24 percentage points, and therefore, storage can be applied to mitigate grid constraint problems, especially around midday, when the number of prosumers causes significant issues. At the national scale, such a transition could reduce operational CO₂ emissions from 66.7 Mt to nearly zero, and slash total residential electricity net demand by 176 TWh. Taking into consideration Poland’s high dependence on fossil fuel imports and its inefficient building stock, improving energy self-sufficiency is critical both for reducing GHG emissions and enhancing energy security. Simultaneously, greater autonomy would improve climate resilience, enabling households to maintain essential functions during outages and strengthening energy democracy by decentralising control over energy generation and flow. To make this happen, Poland will need to install 118 GWh of distributed storage, increase prosumer PV generation fivefold, and implement ambitious retrofits, steps that are technically feasible, especially with strong policy support and infrastructure improvements. |
| Supervisor | Ürge-Vorsatz, Diana |
| Department | Environment Sciences and Policy MSc |
| Full text | https://www.etd.ceu.edu/2025/konik_kamila.pdf |
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