Case Study: Study on Energy Performance of the Centre Region

Short Description

In may 2009, in the context of the revision procedure of the Article 7 of the ERDF Regulation, the European Union allowed to use 4% of the national ERDF amounts to improve energy efficiency in social housing.
In France, this has been integrated to the objectives of the social housing organisations and to the commitments they had made in the context of the French Grenelle plan.
The budget of 320 millions euros allocated to energy performance and sustainable energy in social housing enable the organisations to implement projects that are exemplary and repeatable.

In France, projects that are supported by ERDF must:
- focus on dwellings that are the most consuming energy
- being exemplary and having a knock on effect
- concern a lot of dwellings

ERDF is a complement to other fundings:
- the eco-loan of the Caisse des Dépôts et Consignations
- subsidies from public national agencies (ADEME, ANRU)
- subsidies from local collectivities

The implementation in France has good results thanks a strong mobilisation. At the European level, an active lobbying has been developed to the European Institutions. At the national level, the French Federation USH has worked with the French Administration on the conditions of implementation of the ERDF measure in regions. At least, the French regional associations for social housing have worked with their partners on the identification of the needs in local stocks, the definition of eligibility criterion, a strategy of intervention on the stock and a support to local organisations.
At the local level, the Regional Associations for social housing were mobilised to enable this implementation et to help the SHO developing new projects. They lead different types of actions:

- Identifications of needs.
- Implementation of the partnership.
- Support to project managers.
- Financial engineering.
- Funding and monitoring of projects:

The project led in the Region Centre can be linked to the first action: Identification of needs. Each territory has a housing stock with strong specificities, and it is important to have a precise knowledge of the stock.
Centre Region worked on a diagnosis shared by local partners, to ensure consistency among financial arrangements. They also worked on the performance criteria of the projects supported by the ERDF. Thus, it is very important that the ERDF is in line with the various territorial issues.

Key Elements

Main Results

In France, 79% of the amounts dedicated to social housing are allocated or in procedure. 7 regions have already programmed all their funds, and projects that are waiting for financing represent 17% of these amounts.
According to the budget 40 222 social dwellings have been supported by ERDF.

For the Centre Region the amount has been allocated as follow (million Euro):
Regional ERDF amount: 196 Euro
4% of the ERDF funds for Housing: 7,8
Allocated amounts: 4,0

Lessons learned

In France, the mobilisation to implement the ERDF measure should have strong effects on energy performances of the retrofitted housing stock.

Additional Information

For any information please contact:

Brigitte Jallet
USH Centre director
Tél. 02 188 45000,
Fax : 02 38 68 11 78,
E-mail : arhlmce@union-habitat.org,

Website: www.ush-centre.org