NNA Research: Collaborative Research: Responding to Energy Insecurity in Arctic Housing Using a Community-Based Participatory Research

新北极航行（NNA）是NSF的十大创意之一。NNA项目解决快速变化的北极地区的趋同科学挑战。这项北极研究需要为国家、更大地区和地球仪的经济、安全和复原力提供信息。NNA授权从地方到国际规模的新的研究伙伴关系，使下一代北极研究人员多样化，加强正规和非正规教育的努力，并在适当的情况下整合知识的共同生产。该奖项通过解决以下NNA重点领域的社会系统，自然环境和建筑环境之间的相互作用实现了这一目标的一部分：北极居民，数据和观测，教育，预测和弹性基础设施。这项研究旨在解决阿拉斯加农村社区目前面临的大量现有和新出现的住房挑战。具体来说，这些社区的许多房屋能源效率极低;许多其他房屋的设计不适合阿拉斯加的恶劣气候;许多房屋既旧又拥挤。电力和取暖燃料的高成本加上这些住房挑战，使许多阿拉斯加农村家庭的能源负担很重（即家庭收入的很高比例用于能源成本）。据估计，最脆弱的家庭将其收入的近一半用于能源账单。气候条件的变化加剧了这些挑战。政府资助的提高家庭效率的计划已经进行了多年，然而，在某些情况下，这些效率的提高并没有被家庭使用，和/或没有按预期进行。目前关于为什么会发生这种情况以及可以帮助解决这一问题的解决方案的研究有限。因此，本研究旨在与三个阿拉斯加农村社区和各种关键的非营利组织和其他利益相关者合作，确定更好，更适合文化的方式来适应阿拉斯加农村住房，以减轻能源负担。许多人将受益于这一努力的结果，包括阿拉斯加的房主，整个社会和科学界。具体而言，这些社区的当前和未来房主将受益于更好地设计以适应其文化价值观和利益的能效计划，使房主更有可能从参与中受益。这还将通过支持社会文化和环境联系的方法，减少与能源成本有关的压力，从而改善社区的福祉。社会将受益于旨在实现最大限度的长期能源和排放减少的计划，从而最大限度地提高公共资金的使用效益。科学界将通过更好地了解影响能源效率改善长期成功的关键因素，从这项研究中受益。拟议的研究工作旨在回答以下研究问题：如何适应现有的阿拉斯加原住民住房，以更好地缓解能源不安全？现有的能源效率改造方法的有效性如何，如何改进这些方法以减少长期能源负担？对这些研究问题的答复是通过在Unalakleet、Nome和Quinhagak的那些村庄进行基于社区的参与性研究获得的。通过六项相互关联的任务，研究团队将合作制定改善战略，其中包括文化信仰和价值观，实地数据收集以及综合建筑能源模型，这些模型共同解决现有住房能源负担的确定原因。任务1将建立知识共同生产和与社区合作的方法。 任务2将使用气候模式输出和地面气象站数据沿着社区访谈，为每个社区构建未来气候情景。任务3将评估房屋的特性、效率和长期性能，包括有和没有改造的房屋。通过建筑物验证的能源模型，它还将量化驱动能源负担的因素，以及能源效率的提高对能源负担的影响。任务4将评估阿拉斯加农村社区成员围绕能源使用和节能技术的文化价值观和信仰，从而了解提高能源效率的文化障碍和机会。任务5将确定改造战略，既减少能源负担，考虑到未来的气候情景，并符合阿拉斯加原住民的文化价值观和信仰。它还将建议需要改进能源效率的实施，包括设计变更和/或能源教育。最后一项任务是开发能源工程课程，该课程将在K-12和高等教育教室中实施。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

Navigating the New Arctic (NNA) is one of NSF's 10 Big Ideas. NNA projects address convergence scientific challenges in the rapidly changing Arctic. This Arctic research is needed to inform the economy, security and resilience of the Nation, the larger region and the globe. NNA empowers new research partnerships from local to international scales, diversifies the next generation of Arctic researchers, enhances efforts in formal and informal education, and integrates the co-production of knowledge where appropriate. This award fulfills part of that aim by addressing interactions among social systems, natural environment, and built environment in the following NNA focus areas: Arctic Residents, Data and Observations, Education, Forecasting, and Resilient Infrastructure.This research seeks to address the substantial existing and emerging housing challenges that rural Alaskan communities currently face. Specifically, many homes in these communities are highly energy inefficient; many others were not designed for the harsh Alaskan climate; many are old and overcrowded. The high cost of electricity and heating fuel combined with these housing challenges makes many rural Alaskan homes highly energy burdened (i.e. a high percentage of household income is used for energy costs). The most vulnerable households are estimated to spend nearly half of their income on energy bills. These challenges are worsened by the changing climate conditions. Government-funded programs to improve the efficiency of homes have been ongoing for many years, however, in some cases these efficiency improvements are not being used by households, and/or are not performing as intended. There is currently limited research on why this occurs, and solutions that can help to address this. Therefore, this research seeks to, in collaboration with three rural Alaskan communities and a diversity of key non-profits and other stakeholders, identify better, more culturally appropriate ways to adapt rural Alaskan housing to alleviate energy burden. Many will benefit from the results of this effort, including Alaskan homeowners, society as a whole, and the scientific community. Specifically, current and future homeowners in these communities will benefit from energy efficiency programs that are better designed to fit their cultural values and interests, making the homeowners more likely to benefit from participation. This will also improve the wellbeing of communities by reducing stresses related to energy costs through methods that support socio-cultural and environmental connections. Society will benefit from programs designed to achieve the maximum long-term energy and emissions reductions, thus maximizing the benefits of the use of public money. The scientific community will benefit from this research through the better understanding of key factors influencing the long-term success of energy efficiency improvements. The proposed research effort seeks to answer the following research questions: How can existing Alaska Native housing be adapted to better alleviate energy insecurity? How effective are existing energy efficiency retrofit methods, and how can they be improved to reduce long-term energy burden? The response to these research questions is obtained using a community-based participatory research in the villages of Unalakleet, Nome, and Quinhagak. Through six interlinked tasks, the research team will collaboratively develop improvement strategies that incorporate cultural beliefs and values, field data collection, and integrated building energy models which together address identified causes of energy burden for existing housing. Task 1 will establish the methods for knowledge co-production and collaboration with the communities. Task 2 will use climate model outputs and surface weather station data along with community interviews, to construct future climate scenarios for each community. Task 3 will assess the characteristics, efficiency, and long-term performance of homes, including those with and without retrofits. Through buildings validated energy models, it will also quantify the factors driving energy burden, and the impacts energy efficiency improvements have had on energy burden. Task 4 will assess the cultural values and beliefs that members of rural Alaskan communities have around energy use and energy efficient technology, resulting in an understanding of cultural barriers and opportunities for energy efficiency improvement implementation. Task 5 will identify retrofit strategies which both reduce energy burden considering future climate scenarios, and fit Alaska Native cultural values and beliefs. It will also recommend the need for improvements to energy efficiency implementation, including design changes and/or energy education. The final task will develop energy engineering curriculum which will be implemented in K-12 and higher education classrooms.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.