8 Barriers and opportunities
8.4 Other sources
The studies we referred to earlier (EuroACE and EURIMA) also identify barriers and opportunities that need to be addressed in order to improve the energy effi-ciency/sustainability of residential dwellings.
EuroACE
The EuroACE project observed that the realisation of significant energy and emis-sion saving potential is faced with a number of institutional, economic, legal and so-cial barriers and opportunities (Guertler & Smith 2006). As the project also looked at the new and candidate EU member states (mainly eastern European countries) and focussed on high-rise residential buildings, some barriers and opportunities do not apply to the residential sector as a whole. We give a short overview of the barriers and opportunities that are considered relevant to this project.
Political and institutional
• Knowledge and know-how is needed about the accurate state of high-rise build-ings, the successful implementation of financial instruments and best practices. A number of important European projects can contribute to filling these knowl-edge and know-how gaps.
Financial and economic
• The incentives to save energy should be strengthened so that the target groups of the new and existing financial instruments promoting energy efficiency would become more receptive to them. In this context, there is an important opportu-nity in the extensive European body of knowledge surrounding the design and implementation of effective financial instruments.
• District heating in the high-rise housing stock of new EU members is a barrier because there is no incentive for a householder to save energy and thus it un-dermines the effectiveness of financial instruments. Creating a framework for district heating suppliers to provide a full energy service may supply another means by which to improve high-rise energy efficiency.
• Financial incentives designed to link to the EPBD (and ESD) certification re-quirements present a powerful opportunity to strengthen the case for incorporat-ing energy efficiency improvement into refurbishment.
Legal
• The EPBDs incorporation into national legislation offers a central legal oppor-tunity to drive the improvement of (high-rise) energy efficiency as part of the re-furbishment cycle.
• Inadequate legislation or procedures governing collective ownership of, and de-cision-making about high-rise buildings or estates pose a significant barrier to implementing energy efficient refurbishments. Effective laws or codes of con-duct are essential.
Social
• Marketing and energy advice appropriate to the culture and tailored to the indi-vidual are an essential part of any refurbishment, in particular to counter the bar-rier of entrenched energy use practices, such as opening windows and/or using
secondary heating systems in response to the widespread problem in high-rise buildings of over- and/or under-heating.
• The potentially collective nature of living in high-rise buildings should be har-nessed to get residents to support each other’s energy-saving behaviour, especially in lieu of the requirements for individual metering and billing.
• Employing tried and tested methods of holistic stakeholder involvement with both pre-refurbishment consultation and post-refurbishment evaluation of stake-holders’ views, helps strengthen communities, helps eliminate potential problems before they arise, and contributes to the body of good energy efficient refurbish-ment experiences, in turn helping to improve the often negative perception of high-rise living.
EURIMA
On the basis of a workshop and (scarce) data available an inventory was made of the main barriers in various sectors of the residential market (Klinckenberg & Sunikka 2006). The barriers were consequently linked with promising instruments identified to tackle these barriers using prototypes that have already been in use in various countries. In the table below an overview is given of the key barriers for existing residential buildings and possible promising instruments.
Key barrier(s) Promising instrument(s) Suggested policy pack-ages
Owner-occupied
⋅ Lack of upfront money
⋅ Lack of professional ad-vice and support, limited offers, complicated pro-cedures
⋅ Lack of specific knowl-edge/knowledge of al-ternatives
⋅ Lack of obligation
⋅ Lack of organisation of homeowners/complex decision-making process
⋅ Preferential loans (perhaps in combina-tion with the EPBD energy certificates) and tax credits for installing energy sav-ing products
⋅ Utility obligations
⋅ Energy performance advice
⋅ Organisational support like Chance En-ergiepass Partner concept
⋅ Homeowner associations
⋅ Demonstration projects and perhaps
⋅ Energy regulations for the existing stock
⋅ Preferential loans for significant energy per-formance improve-ments combined with energy audits with or-ganisational support
⋅ Energy upgrading re-quirements combined with energy audits with organisational support
⋅ Tax rebates and VAT reduction are not seen as being beneficial
⋅ Lack of specific knowl-edge/knowledge of al-ternatives
⋅ Preferential loans (perhaps in combina-tion with the EPBD energy certificates) and
⋅ Tax credits for installing energy-saving products
⋅ Utility obligations
⋅ Tax credits as in Green Landlord Scheme
⋅ Organisational support like Chance En-ergiepass Partner Concept
⋅ Demonstration projects and perhaps
⋅ Energy regulations for the existing stock
⋅ Energy upgrading re-quirements combined with energy audits with organisational support
⋅ Tax credits for install-ing energy-savinstall-ing
⋅ Implications for low-income households
⋅ Energy regulations for the existing stock and
⋅ Energy Audits
⋅ Reduced VAT for energy-saving
materi-⋅ Energy upgrading re-quirements combined with energy audits with organisational support
als and installations
⋅ Utility obligations ⋅ Obligations for the
pub-lic authorities to set an example in terms of fi-nance schemes Source: Klinckenberg & Sunikka, 2006.
8.5 Conclusions
Barriers
In general, the lack of knowledge and information and the lack of cost effec-tiveness and funding.
For the social sector there are not many extra or specific barriers mentioned.
For owner-occupiers and private landlords the lack of knowledge and infor-mation, and funding are seen as the main problems. In these sectors, sustain-ability is not a real issue or a priority. The quality of the dwelling is consid-ered to be sufficient and there are other priorities in which to invest money.
An additional barrier for private investors is that they do not profit them-selves from the investment.
Opportunities
Opportunities are going to be generated by governmental actions (realising energy ambitions, legislative adaptations) and market processes. Demands of owners and occupants (e.g. with regard to comfort) have been changing and are going to change in the near future which will have a positive effect on sustainable renovation. In this context, the introduction of the EPBD offers specific opportunities according to the respondents in the various countries.
Other opportunities identified are the positive influences of the dissemina-tion of existing demonstradissemina-tion projects (the United Kingdom, the Nether-lands, Austria) and the growing use of existing practical energy concepts (France).
Governments should play more of a leading role to realise sustainable reno-vation.
There is also a need for more support for technical innovations (Finland, France, Netherlands) and more support for educational programmes, includ-ing programmes for DIY stores and warehouses (Finland, France, Nether-lands).