Elevators and escalators: Energy performance and strategies to promote energy efficiency

Elevators and escalators are the crucial element to make it practical and comfortable to live, work and shop several floors above and below ground. In tertiary sector of the EU-27, about 1.6 million elevators are installed as well as about 56,000 escalators and moving walks. Their energy consumption adds up to 3 to 8 % of the overall electricity consumption of the building. However, elevators and escalators have not received much attention in terms of energy efficiency for a long time. In this paper, we characterize the energy consumption profiles these vertical transportation devices in standby and running based on a monitoring campaign conducted within the E4-project. An estimation of the overall energy consumed by elevators and escalators is presented. Building on this, potentials for saving energy are identified - both from a technical point of view as well as from a behavioral approach. The technical analyses show that the savings potential is up to 66 %. The behavioral approach includes an interview study and identifies market barriers to the penetration of energy efficient technology and proposes strategies to overcome those barriers.