For countries in the Med region like Spain and Italy the use of Structural Funds, despite proposals of the Commission for efficiency and renewables, is not to be taken for granted that progress is in store. There is a need for a real re-thinking of the strategy in light of all the economic problems. A lack of a secure framework and also doubts about the possibility to use the funds due to budget deficit limits and the grey area of compliance with European Legislation such as the EPBD. Systems like the Jessica EIB funding scheme could be used to overcome the problem of budget deficit limits but are not yet in place.

Also in the technical field there is a risk to encourage an over-engineering (also in terms of up-front costs) by emphasizing the Passivhaus standard and some related- technologies such as the mechanical ventilation and the strong envelope insulation and to miss an opportunity for Med regions to build low energy homes more in line with their climatic and citizens lifestyles specificities. Summer comfort and the energy consumption for cooling should be considered key issues in the EPB-regulation transposition to pave the way for the implementation of nearly Zero Energy homes in the Southern Europe.

These are the issues that are being looked into by the Nearly Zero Med Taskforce. They began their work by linking up with existing initiatives such as IRH-MED, ELHIMED, MARIE, RELS and MEDBEE. The MARIE and RELS projects were presented at the Med Taskforce meeting in Madrid. POWER HOUSE Representatives spoke at the ELHIMED conference and attended the MEDBEE forum in Brussels.

Some additional partners from Greece, Cyprus, South of France, Malta and Portugal have linked up with the nZEC consortium. This will broaden the geographical coverage to the whole MED region.

The home of the Med Taskforce is here.

Within the POWER HOUSE nearly Zero Energy Challenge project, 30 test cases of low and nearly Zero Energy Building in different European social and cooperative housing will be monitored.

The aim is to show the real energy performance of buildings, and not only the estimated values. Monitoring will cover heating, cooling, production of hot water and building technical services, including ventilation and lighting. The production of in situ renewable energy systems will also be monitored, according to the requirements of the new EPBD directive.

All data will be made publicly accessible through the Sole platform. Consumption indexes will be available in different formats and it will be easy, for example, to compare performances of buildings in different locations. Project partners have started collecting data since autumn 2012 and the first monitoring results will be on line from the beginning of 2013.

The European Investment Bank (EIB) has launched a public consultation as part of the review of its energy sector lending policy, open until the end of the year. The review process is expected to be finalised in summer 2013.

Chaired by Cheryl Fisher, the new Director of Energy Department of ‘Europe’s Bank’ hosted an open workshop in Brussels on the 7th of December to hear first-hand views from stakeholders. The EIB delegation was not limited to the speakers but totalled about 15 experts from the bank working in all energy departments.

While topics covered ranged from nuclear power to ETS (the EIB price for tonnes of carbon is €30 – so higher than the current market price) to carbon capture and storage,  energy efficiency came through as a clear priority both in the presentations and interventions from participants. The Bank allocates €85 billion annually to energy efficiency compared to €65 billion for gas/networks and €50 billion for renewables to 2020, with buildings identified as a priority sector.

What is blocking Cash Flow for Energy Efficiency?

The Bank’s experts have a clear view of the obstacles to lending to energy efficiency in general, many of which apply to the social housing sector. Projects are often small and fragmented in nature compared with the big energy infrastructure projects such as power plants which must become a thing of the past. Other obstacles leading to limited access to capital include budget deficit limits, retail banks not understanding the business of energy efficiency. This fragmentation results in high transactions costs, excessive complexity for small actors and a clear need for bundling of projects and intermediaries. Technical assistance schemes such as ELENA designed to assist local actors in prepared projects are too large for some (although the EIB did stress that 80% of ELENA money has been used).

Fisher explained that the bundling of maximum number of projects to cut down on transactions costs while ensuring quality control and respect for the banks criteria is the “holy grail of the EIB as other banks” while explaining that a big part of the transaction cost incurred is the price of conducting due diligence for loans. Speaking on behalf of CECODHAS Housing Europe, at the workshop, Marco Corradi, Chair of the Energy Experts Network gave a clear message about the logistical problems from the operational perspective of housing providers saying “the investment sizes are much too big ( e.g; 50 million limit for use of ELENA) and require complex collaboration between many municipalities”

He called for “capacity building tools which are more in tune with the operational level.” What can be concluded is that we are dealing with a size mis-match and that there is a need to examine the use of financial intermediaries to make the bridge. The possibility of building capacity of existing structures to channel through EIB funds such as the Caisse de Depot in France or of KfW in Germany is a clear one. In some countries, social housing federations, could also be potential aggregators as many already function as banks for their members. Working with such counterparts , when needed in partnership with local banks, has been proven to bring down transaction costs, risk and thereby interest rates. Where such institutions do not exist, their establishment is a must. They could also bring together new financing streams such as those which will be generated by energy supplier obligations in article 7 of the new Energy Efficiency Obligations or emissions trading schemes, particularly to address fuel poverty.

Are ESCOs the way to Go?

Another question included in the EIB written consultation is the role of energy service companies (ESCOs) in developing energy efficiency investments. Corradi notes the potential pit-falls of relying on energy savings of individual projects to cover investment and proposed mixing buildings of different types within refurbishment project to help spread the gains and defend general interest.

"A private market controlling the entire project structuring stream for the realization of energy efficiency in buildings would privilege those projects which are most profitable (such as swimming pools and rest homes), overlooking those projects which provide per se less savings, such as schools and social housing, particularly where under-heating due to fuel poverty is an issue".  To avoid this he proposed "Initial screening and bundling of projects together followed by supervision by Public Social Housing Companies and Public Administration can guarantee the general interest and ensure the realization of all types of projects, which have been demonstrated to be profitable also when combined all together."

What is clear is that working with different funds with different sets of rules and procedures will definitely not help to increase the flow of finance to energy efficiency projects. Bundling on the borrowers side must be facilitated by the merging of financial streams and simplification of procedures on the lenders side. Existing public banks and housing providers can potentially be activated as effective aggregators working in a more uniform way and helping to reach the Holy Grail.

CECODHAS Housing Europe will answer the EIB consultation and welcomes all feedback on this article. You can view the consultation and submit your feedback here: http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/9SWM7HL.

Related: EU-Energy Performance Contracting Campaign

The energy transition requires integrated local heating, cooling and energy efficiency planning. While energy efficiency is top priority for housing providers, they are also aware of the potential to use the buildings they manage to produce, consume and store energy. The Nearly Zero Energy Building Obligations set by the EPBD also require the production of renewable energy either on site or nearby all new buildings.

It is vital to review which factors are slowing down the achievement of those objectives. 

Within the framework of the launch of the Nearly Zero Energy Challenge, in the discussion following the presentation of Angelo Consoli (president of CETRI), social housing practitioners from different countries gave their views on why their buildings are not reaching the full production potential.

In Germany, it is very difficult for cooperatives to produce energy and sell it to third parties. It can be possible as long as it is for consumption by their members, but if there’s a surplus it is difficult to sell it to the grid as this would mean that the housing cooperative becomes an energy producer and is taxed accordingly thereby losing the normal tax free status enjoyed by housing cooperatives. There is a perception that the grid has been designed for large producers.  In Austria there is already installation of solar panels on a large scale in social housing, but this wouldn’t be economically viable without subsidies.

In France, until now these facilities are profitable thanks to the mechanism of acquisition of electricity established by the government. USH, the French Social Housing body fears that any changes in energy cogeneration price (gas and wood) may affect the profitability of the systems and thus represents a risk for households.

In Spain, until there is auto-consumption of renewable energy in Spain there can be no such thing as Nearly Zero Energy Housing. Consoli explained that the system is set up so that you have to feed locally produced energy to the grid and this is currently a complex procedure, but said that it should be possible for households to use the energy thereby reduce their bills and only send back the surplus.

In the UK Feed In Tariffs (FITs) for PV have seen a large take-up from Social Landlords. With their focus on affordable housing, social landlords invariably direct investment towards low income households and can therefore help to ensure social equity from funding mechanisms like FITs. They regret that the government has not yet properly recognised or supported this role.

In Holland, Aedes, the social housing federation, together with a big coalition (green NGO’s, municipalities, construction & installation, tenants and home-owners) sent a letter to the Dutch government with its vision of decentralized energy generation. Now it is planning to propose to the Parliament concrete measures which can allow small end users and also tenants to have net earnings on PV on a yearly basis. Currently this is not possible. 

European Parliament Report under Preparation

The preparation of the Report on current challenges and opportunities for renewable energy on the European energy market from Herbert Reul MEP represents an opportunity to bring to light these obstacles. CECODHAS Housing Europe is proposing the introduction of an amendment as follows:

"Notes that housing can play an increasing part in power generation; electricity from renewable energy generated inside or in immediate proximity to residential buildings and primarily used in the building immediately or after temporary storage does unload the power grids and can make energy supply safer and more affordable" (based on the position of GdW's Energy Expert Ingrid Vogler).

The report should also stress the importance of the diversification of ownership of energy and an increase in the proportion of community owned energy.

Estonian nationwide Energy Efficiency Week took place between 5 and 11 November 2012. The event was organized for the fourth time and all these years the Estonian Union of Co-operative Housing Associations (EKYL) has been one of the main organizers in cooperation with the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Communications, KredEx, Tartu Regional Energy Agency and others. The purpose of the Energy Efficiency Week is to raise people's awareness of the importance of energy efficiency and give tips on how to decrease energy consumption.

The one week campaigns includes several activities and events to make the topic more audible and visible. This time, the activities of EKYL during the Energy Efficiency Week were targeted at housing associations all over Estonia to learn from each other. Visits to renovated apartment buildings or energy-efficiency seminars for members of housing associations were organized every day during the week in different cities.

The Ministry of Finance of the Republic of Estonia have named the list of organizations that will be involved in the preparation of the 2014-2020 Structural Funds programming period in Estonia. The Estonian Union of Co-operative Housing Associations is the only non-governmental partner in the list that is specialized to represent the interests of cooperative housing and apartment associations.

Rakvere (Estonia) is one of the signatories and is placing particular emphasis on energy efficiency in buildings: ”We are determined to become Estonia’s pioneer in that regard, championing our far-reaching vision of smart and efficient energy use” said Andres Jaadla, former Mayor of Rakvere.

“Our Sustainable Energy Action Plan charts six main lines of action for the city, with the purpose of meeting the commitments taken with the Covenant of Mayors and we consider these as our long-term guiding principles. One of our utmost priorities is to change Rakvere’s heating system. Indeed, we would like to introduce district heating and replace fossil fuel use by bio fuels. Heat consumption is a crucial issue to address, energy efficiency needs to be encouraged and buildings ought to be properly renovated and insulated”.

To read the full interview, click here.

For more information on the Covenant of Mayors, visit the website: www.covenantofmayors.eu.

Günther H. Oettinger, EU Commissioner for Energy opened the “RENOVATE EUROPE DAY 2012” with a video address. “Energy efficiency is for the EU the most direct and cost-effective way to achieve our strategic goals” the commissioner said. “Despite the clear economic and social benefits of energy efficiency, Europe is only half way towards its 20% objective in 2020. To close the current gap, the European Commission is putting in place a comprehensive policy framework to support energy efficiency.[…]  With the revised Energy Performance of Buildings Directive and the newly agreed Energy Efficiency Directive, we are putting in place a broad range of measures that Member States can use to improve the efficiency of their energy use”.

The full text version is available here.

For more information on REday 2012, visit the website: www.renovate-europe.eu.

On the occasion of Co-operatives United, the culmination event of the International Year of Cooperatives, Cooperatives Europe organised a series of events on cooperatives and renewable energy in Manchester.

On November 2, CECODHAS Housing Europe took part in the three panel discussions on renewable energy cooperatives organised by Cooperatives Europe together with Rescoop.EU and The Co-operative Group. The discussion looked at the lack of information on setting up energy cooperatives and the best way to promote them.

Dirk Vansintjan shared the background of the REScoop 202020 project and encouraged any existing renewable energy cooperative to sign up on their website: www.rescoop.eu.

The AFTER Project aims to enable participating and non-participating Social Housing Institutions and Organizations all over Europe to improve the energy efficiency of their housing stock with cost optimal solutions. Its goal is to promote and develop existing European knowledge in the areas of energy saving strategies and encourage their implementation by companies in the housing sector.

Social Housing Organizations in 6 different countries (Czech Republic, Denmark, France, Germany, Italy, and Slovenia) and their partners - including National Housing Associations, Scientific Committee and National Tenants Associations - are cooperating to highlight and evaluate the most efficient and adaptable energy saving measures.

During the first phase of the project AFTER partners have aggregated the different kinds of Energy Saving Measures and created a common framework for evaluating them and sharing information.

18 Pilot Sites have been identified by the participating Social Housing Organizations. According to the pilot energy saving measures (ESMs) implemented on this Pilot Sites, partners proposed some optimization suggestions in order to improve the efficiency of the measures and guarantee their performance.

For more information visit their website: afterproject.eu.

On the 9th of October in Málaga (Spain), the International Congress on "Energy Efficiency for Social Housing: challenges for sustainable urban building models in the Mediterranean" took place and was held in the Urban Environment Observatory (OMAU), within the framework of the European Project Elih-MED.

Featured members of the POWER HOUSE EUROPE Platform attended the conference: Sorcha Edwards (POWER HOUSE EUROPE Coordinator), Marco Corradi (Italian member of the Platform) and Begoña Serrano and Laura Soto (Spanish member of the Platform).

For more information, click on the link: http://shar.es/cdi6P.

The sole responsibility for the content of this Newsletter 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.

For further information, please visit www.powerhouseeurope.eu