Empower public authorities to establish a long-term strategy for mobilizing investment in the energy efficient renovation of the building stock

Periodic Reporting for period 2 - EmBuild (Empower public authorities to establish a long-term strategy for mobilizing investment in the energy efficient renovation of the building stock)

Okres sprawozdawczy: 2017-06-01 do 2018-08-31

To strengthen policies that promote retrofitting and modernizing existing buildings, Article 4 of EU Energy Efficiency Directive (EED) requires EU member states to establish a long-term strategy for mobilizing investment in the renovation of the national building stock by 30 April 2014, and every 3 years thereafter. Art. 5 EED requests national governments to proceed in an exemplary way towards the renovation of the countries' public building stock. All EU member states have adhered to the requirement of Art. 4 EED, albeit most did not meet the 2014 deadline and some submitted their strategies as late as March 2015. Ten member states have submitted their second national building renovation strategy due by April 30, 2017.

It is well understood that the challenges of Art. 4 and Art. 5 EED may best be met if (i) national strategies consider and build on challenges and solutions found at regional and local level, and (ii) if national level strategies are translated and adapted to regional or local level expressions. The reason why is, among other things, that most of the public buildings are owned and occupied by regional and local level administrations. In many countries, however, the goals of the national strategies and the suggested measures have not really filtered down to regional and local level yet. The EmBuild approach was therefore to mirror national level strategies at the local level and to foster deep renovation in the building sector by municipal public building renovation strategies.

EmBuild prepared a methodology that allows energy managers at municipal level to analyze their building stock and to suggest preferences and priorities for renovation activities. Preliminary analysis looks at basic data of the public building stock with a view to identifying priority buildings with the highest potential for energy-savings. Detailed analysis for priority buildings is performed before the start of renovation measures. In addition to the technical measures required for the deep renovation of buildings, EmBuild suggested methods to identifying low- and no-cost measures, as for example improvements of energy user behaviour, for the improvement of energy performance of buildings.

Based on this approach, the EmBuild project triggered and supported the development of municipal building renovation plans covering public buildings in 129 municipalities in five countries (Bulgaria, Croatia, Germany, Romania, Serbia, and Slovenia). These plans, when fully implemented, will lead to energy savings in the amount of 263 GWh/year.

EmBuild dissemination activities for the distribution of developed concepts, methods and tools as well as of the achieved projet results included publications (newsletters, social media posts etc.) and presentations to local, regional, national and European conferences and fairs reaching in total more than 45,500 experts and stakeholders all over Europe. Dissemination and discussion of Embuild concepts, methods and tools was further enhanced by an intensive social media campaign facilitating almost 85,000 contacts. All results of the EmBuild project are available for free download from the EmBuild website www.embuild.eu which counted approximately 140,000 contacts during project duration.

The EmBuild approach of facilitating the development and implementation of local public building renovation strategies is very topical. It takes into account that a local building renovation strategy is not a purely technical matter. Political considerations and additional benefits on top of energy efficiency gains are also to be taken into consideration. Thus, the EmBuild project touched on four dimensions:

1. Analysis: Local building renovation strategies shall clearly specify which type of energy efficiency measures should be conducted in which building, at what time and in which sequence. This requires, in addition to the analysis of technical issues, also an analysis of economic, social and environmental benefits that may arise in addition to energy efficiency gains when a public building is renovated. EmBuild has prepared the necessary tools, reached out to target public authorities and supported them in analyzing municipalities' own building stock. Municipalities developed their strategies on this basis either individually at local level (Bulgaria, Germany, Romania, Serbia, and Slovenia) or jointly at county level (Croatia).

2. Policy: A local strategy does not exist in a vacuum but needs to consider and comply with national and regional policies and regulations. Thus, EmBuild identified the barriers and incentives that either hinder or facilitate the deep renovations of public buildings and assessed how these barriers could be addressed in national renovation strategies.

3. Actors: During the development and implementation of local renovation strategies large groups of actors have to cooperate on site including e.g. public actors, banks and investors, owners and users of buildings, architects, and craftsmen. Building a common vision and creating awareness of the needs to jointly prepare a renovation strategy is always paramount.

4. Finance: There is no renovation project without an investment plan. Therefore, EmBuild expanded its awareness raising activities to include potential investors. The aim was to cooperate with potential investors at an early stage to increase the likelihood of a renovation strategy attracting the necessary funding.

Resulting strategies should go beyond measuring energy efficiency gains. Other benefits that may arise from building renovation shall also be taken into consideration. A study conducted by the EmBuild project identified such wider benefits and sketched tools for measuring them.

The main progress achieved by the EmBuild project is that local public building renovation strategies based upon EmBuild concepts and tools become more ambitious and sustainable. Application of EmBuild concepts and tools helps increasing the political buy-in at local, regional and national level. And finally the better planning and implementation of local building renovation strategies may help EU member states to better achieving the energy saving and CO2 emissions reduction targets they committed themselves to in their national building renovation strategies and plans..

EmBuild has directly influenced more than 1,450 public officials who participated in EmBuild activities. The project directly supported the development of local strategies and plans for 129 municipalities in Bulgaria, Croatia (88 municipalities joint planning at county level), Germany, Romania, Serbia, and Slovenia. Implementation of these plans will result in total energy savings of 263 GWh/year.

EmBuild visual identity (logo2)

EmBuild visual identity (logo1)

Periodic Reporting for period 2 - EmBuild (Empower public authorities to establish a long-term strategy for mobilizing investment in the energy efficient renovation of the building stock)

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