Agent Based Modeling to Estimate the Adoption of Energy Efficient Building Technologies

Agent based modeling (ABM) is a bottom-up method of modeling complex systems that simulates the actions and interactions of autonomous agents. ABM is being used to look at consumer adoption of technologies ranging from cosmetics to electric vehicles and are often used as a replacement for diffusion models. This seminar presents the use of ABM to estimate the adoption of energy efficient building technologies. In the model, building owners make decisions based on a wide variety of economic and non-economic factors. A study of the nationwide adoption of hot water heating technology is shown.