A systematic review of occupant behavior in building energy policy

Buildings play a dominant role in global efforts towards energy consumption reduction, greenhouse gas (GHG) emission mitigation, as well as global clean energy transition. Building Energy Policies (BEP) improved globally and quickly with a growing number of building codes implemented over the past decade. Occupant Behavior (OB) has significant impacts on building energy performance and occupant comfort, despite often being not well understood and oversimplified in BEPs. This paper highlighted the research needs of properly integrating OB in building energy polices by presenting a literature review to identify the key questions and challenges related to building technical standards and regulations, building information policies, building energy incentives, and policy evaluations and way forward. Challenges and opportunities of OB in BEP are also discussed with respect to technical innovation and digitalization, as well as concerns related to energy efficiency and fairness. There has been growing interests, research and applications in this field, but significant challenges and opportunities still lie ahead. •Occupant behavior has significant impacts on building energy.•Misunderstood and oversimplified occupant behavior cause problems in policies.•There are research needs of occupant behavior in building energy policies.•Key questions, challenges and opportunities were discussed.