European campaign for Smart Energy Buildings

Our vision

As soon as possible, Europe’s buildings shall stop wasting huge amounts of energy and

shall become completely independent from the use of non renewable energy sources such

as gas, oil, coal and uranium.

By 2050 at latest, all new buildings as well as the existing building stock will be heated,

cooled and operated only with renewable energies. This will happen through a smart

combination of energy efficiency measures and of renewable energy supply technologies.

This is our vision, but not only:

It is a smart deal!

Yes, we can do it!

Actually, we must,

and, yes, we will do it...

... as soon as possible!

A European campaign for Smart Energy Buildings will be launched in 2011 by a

consortium of leading associations, agencies and companies specialised in renewable

energy, energy efficiency and sustainable communication1. The campaign is supported by

the Intelligent Energy Europe Programme of the European Commission.2

1 EREC (European Renewable Energy Council), EuroACE (European Alliance of Companies for Energy Efficiency in Buildings),

CEETB (European Energy Efficiency Installers – Committee for the Construction Industry), FEDARENE (European Federation of Regional Energy and Environment Agencies), Energy Cities (Association of European local authorities inventing their energy future), Climate Alliance (Association of European local authorities committed to climate protection), ADEME (French Environment and Energy Management Agency), eclareon, Pleon Ketchum.

2 The sole responsibility for the content of this document lies with the authors. It does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the

European Union. Neither the EACI nor the European Commission is responsible for any use that may be made of the information contained therein.

It is a smart deal!

The building sector has the largest potential to reduce energy consumption and CO2

emissions, both in the short and in the long term, ahead of energy supply, industry and other

sectors3. Every fossil energy unit, or kWh of electricity unnecessarily used to heat or cool

buildings could and should be kept for other purposes, for which alternatives are not

available or less convenient.

Investing in energy efficiency measures and renewable energy supply for our buildings is

one of the most economic ways to achieve a number of benefits for building owners,

building users, and society in general.

Smart energy building solutions replace imported fuels with domestic technologies

and local jobs.

Investment in smart energy buildings technologies are a cheap, low hanging fruit, i.e.

the most economic strategy to reduce the energy consumption of many households,

organisations, and of society in general.

Smart energy buildings protect individuals and society from the risk of interruptions

of energy supply. In the last years, we have seen how vulnerable Europe is to gas

supply interruptions during the winter time: whole regions remain cold, life is put in

danger. Smart energy buildings can be heated autonomously. Every step in this

direction reduces our risk and vulnerability.

Investment in smart energy solutions for buildings immediately increases the capital

value of the property and leads to long term reductions in operating costs.

Smart energy buildings are an insurance against the risk of severe price increases of

conventional energy sources. Many experts assert that this risk is likely to worsen in

the foreseeable future. In this case building owners, building users and society in

general will be better off if they have already made their buildings energy smart.

Smart energy buildings are the best antidote to fuel poverty.

Smart energy buildings can contribute to the preservation of our local and global

environment at relatively low costs.

3 For the short term: Buildings and Climate Change, UNEP Sustainable Buildings & Climate Initiative. For the long

term: Common carbon metric for measuring energy use & reporting greenhouse gas emissions from building

operations, UNEP, World Resources Institute, 2010.

Yes, we can do it!

We already have the technologies to massively reduce the energy consumption of

buildings with a return on investment within the lifetime of the equipment.

In existing buildings, it is possible to achieve very substantial reductions of conventional

energy consumption by investing in a smart combination of energy efficiency measures and

renewable supply technologies. The investment can pay itself back in a number of years,

and certainly well within the lifetime of the building, more so when energy prices remain

reasonably high. Yes, we can start now. Unlike some so-called “promising” CO2 or energy

saving technologies that might be available, in the best case scenario, in the coming

decades, smart energy building solutions are available and affordable today.

Millions of building owners and users can contribute now to the (r)evolution towards a

sustainable building sector.

Buildings completely independent from conventional energy sources have already

been demonstrated. In the near future, they can become the cost-competitive standard.

As for new buildings, thousands of passive houses built in many different countries4 show in

practice that very smart energy buildings are possible.

4 See http://www.passivhausprojekte.de/projekte.php?lang=en According to the Passive House Institute, a

passive residential building is defined as following: Annual heating requirement ≤ 15 kWh/(m²a), Primary energy

Further improvements will occur, leading to cost reductions, easier installation and larger

dissemination. For instance, solar houses covering 100% of their heating demand with solar

thermal energy from their own roof have been demonstrated in several places from Sweden

to the Alps5.

Actually, we must.

It is nothing new, but it is a fact: we must dramatically change our energy consuming

patterns, as individuals and collectively, for a number of compelling reasons:

Europe imports nearly 60% of its energy, and the dependency is forecast to grow if no

action is taken. Millions of Europeans have already experienced interruption of supply

leaving their homes, offices, schools, hospitals cold in winter. Every additional smart

energy building reduces our vulnerability and improves our trade balance.

For individuals, and for our economies, smart energy buildings are an insurance against

the risk of sudden, strong increases in energy price.

Buildings represent over a third of total carbon emissions in the EU, providing a key

opportunity to contribute to carbon mitigation and air quality objectives by moving to

zero carbon. In the long term, there is simply no alternative: long before the last barrels

of oil will be exposed in museums, fossil energy sources will become too scarce and

expensive to be wasted on heating and cooling buildings.

Some facts & figures:

Buildings are responsible for about 40% of the EU's total final energy consumption and

CO2 emissions in the European Union6.

The lion’s share of the energy consumed in buildings is related to heat demand, only a

small fraction to electrical appliances. Heat demand can be easily reduced by efficiency

measures; the remaining demand can be easily covered with renewable sources.

With energy saving measures alone, 154 Mtoe per year can be cost-effectively saved in

buildings up to 2020. This represents circa 13% of the current total final energy

consumption in the EU, or the total energy consumption including industry and transport

of Belgium, Netherlands, Luxembourg, Ireland and Bulgaria together.

460 million tonnes of CO2 emissions per year could be avoided each year from

buildings using existing products and services.

270 billion € could be saved annually via the implementation of simple energy efficiency

measures in buildings, such as wall and roof insulation7.

consumption ≤ 120 kWh/(m²a), Airtightness for building envelope n50 ≤ 0,6 air changes/h. With this level of

efficiency, it is usually possible to cover the remaining demand with renewable energy sources.

5 http://www.sonnenhaus-institut.de/ http://www.jenni.ch/pdf/Artikel_CompactThyssen_english.pdf

http://www.jenni.ch/pdf/Artikel_SunandWindenergy2.pdf

6 European Commission, SEC(2008) 286, http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=SEC:2008:2865:FIN:EN:PDF

A 2010 study showed that, for Hungary alone, up to 131,000 net new jobs could be created

by 2020 via a large-scale programme for deep renovation of buildings, as opposed to

43,000 jobs via a sub-optimal renovation alternative.8 EU-wide, millions of jobs could be

created if Europe realises our vision.

Yes, we will!

Investments in smart energy building solutions must take place at the same time in new

buildings and in existing buildings.

The average yearly new build rate is estimated to be between 1% and 1.3% of the existing

building stock of approximately 210 million buildings in Europe, with around 53 billion m² of

usable indoor space for all types of human activity. The vast majority of projects are oriented

to the minimum requirements under national building regulations which do not come close to

the nearly zero energy standard, nor to the passive house standards already implemented

many thousands of times over across Europe. Every new building not benefiting from state

of the art efficiency and renewable technologies is a missed opportunity, leading to

excessive energy consumption for the next decades or centuries.

Given the relatively low number of new buildings, the bulk of the potential lies in the

renovation of the existing building stock. However, major renovations take place on average

every 30-40 years. If the window of opportunity offered by a major renovation has gone,

implementing renewable or energy efficiency technologies becomes more expensive and

difficult.

Therefore, it is crucial that a large part of the renovation projects are deep energy

renovations, i.e. aiming at a massive reduction of the energy consumption, and at a

renewable supply for the remaining energy needs. Currently, however, most renovation

projects probably reach only a 15-20% energy savings without any renewable energy

supply, rather than the 60-90% (deep renovation) cost-effective savings potential of any

retrofit.

From looking at these figures, it is plain to see that a business as usual scenario will not

allow for a significant change in the energy performance of Europe’s buildings over the next

decade, apart, perhaps, for the small stock of new buildings.

7 Sensitivity Analysis of Cost Effective Climate Protection in the EU Building Stock – Ecofys VI – 6 June 2006

http://www.eurima.org/uploads/Documents/documents/Sensitivity-analysis_EcofysVI_06June06_final.pdf

8 Employment Impacts of a Large-Scale Deep Building Energy Retrofit Programme in Hungary, Center for Climate

Change and Sustainable Energy Policy of the Central European University, 2010.

The European campaign for Smart Energy Buildings will contribute to move Europe from

a loser, business as usual scenario towards the realisation of our vision.

It is a smart deal. We can do it. Actually we know we have to do it. And we want all relevant

stakeholders to get active and to decide: Let’s do it!