To capitalise on the key findings of the POWER HOUSE nearly-Zero Energy Challenge! project - particularly those of the Financing nZEB TaskForce - Housing Europe held on 24 March 2015 in Brussels the Workshop "European Fund for Strategic Investments and Energy Union: opportunities and challenges for the Public, Cooperative and Social Housing sector".

How to create synergies between the EU Investment Plan (i.e. the European Fund for Strategic Investments), the European Structural and Investment Funds and other type of financing tools in order to deliver a large number of successful renovation projects that will on the one hand reduce the carbon footprint of the sector while ensuring better living conditions for residents coupled with affordable running costs? These is the key question that speakers (EIB, EC and EP representatives and Housing Europe members) and participants (other relevant stakeholders - mainly Banks and Financial Aggregators) tried to answer to.

In a nutshell, the outcome of this debate was that to reconcile both sustainable refurbishments and operating costs with better comfort and high energy performance, there is a need to further invest in R&D and develop innovative cost-efficient industrial processes. Furthermore, the access to low-cost finance should be improved (which in many cases has to take the form of public financial support – for instance with the EIB, the European Structural and Investment Funds or potentially the European Fund for Strategic Investments) and finally a need to better quantify and value the socio-economic impact of investing in retrofitting of social housing.

Download here the report of the Workshop "European Fund for Strategic Investments and Energy Union: opportunities and challenges for the Public, Cooperative and Social Housing sector". 

On 4 March 2015, Housing Europe organised in the framework of the Financing nZEC TaskForce the Workshop "Financing the Energy Transition in the affordable housing sector" in order to explore conditions of success of financial models for energy efficiency in the affordable housing sector.

The introduction given on the current market situation and trends towards 2020 resulting from the report “Energy refurbishment for sustainable Social, Public and Cooperative Housing: insights on the current market & trends towards 2020”, offered a good starting point for the debate with representatives from the European Investment Bank and DG Energy, European Commission and the other participants (download here the presentations made during the Workshop).

In a nutshell, the outcome of this debate was that there is no one-size-fits all approach of low-carbon finance in the affordable housing sector. Factors such as type of housing tenure, type of rent legislation, potential of energy savings due to climate specificities need to be taken into consideration when reflecting on how to improve the supply and demand for finance so as to trigger the energy transition in the affordable housing sector. Bearing this in mind, in a further step, Housing Europe will encourage the development of Low-carbon Finance Platforms in various Countries that would reflect those specificities.

The Workshop was also the occasion to launch the Report "Exemplary Financing Models from across the European Union" recently published by the Financing nZEC TaskForce.

Download here the report of the Workshop "Financing the Energy Transition in the affordable housing sector".