The Role of AI and IoT in Achieving Net-Zero Energy High-Rise Buildings in China

Abstract

China's building sector accounts for roughly 20 to 22 percent of the country's total carbon emissions and must peak alongside the broader economy by 2030 under China's dual-carbon commitments, yet high-rise buildings — a defining feature of Chinese urban form — present specific technical challenges for reaching net-zero energy performance that low-rise typologies do not. This article examines the role of artificial intelligence (AI) and the Internet of Things (IoT) in advancing net-zero energy performance in China's high-rise building stock. Drawing on recent academic literature on nearly-zero-energy buildings (NZEBs), AI-enabled building energy management, and China's building-sector decarbonization pathway, the study finds that AI and IoT contribute primarily through operational optimization — predictive HVAC control, occupancy-based automation, and digital-twin-based performance monitoring — rather than through the building envelope and on-site generation measures that dominate current Chinese NZEB policy and standards. The analysis concludes that AI and IoT are necessary but insufficient tools for high-rise net-zero performance, and are most effective when layered onto, rather than substituted for, the physical envelope and renewable-generation measures already prioritized in China's national NZEB standards.