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The Renovation Wave: an opportunity to scale-up real energy savings through energy management

(EurActiv, 25 Jun 2020) The European Commission has recently stated its will to put the European Green Deal at the heart of the Recovery Plan. After the worldwide COVID-19 crisis, which has heavily affected the European economy, it has clearly appeared that Europe needed to find cost-effective solutions to achieve its 2050 climate targets. This urging necessity has put an emphasis on the Renovation wave, recognising that the building sector had a huge untapped potential in terms of both energy and emissions savings.

Valérie Plainemaison is the Secretary General of EFIEES, the European Federation of Intelligent Energy Efficiency Services, which is the voice of energy service companies (ESCOs) and their national associations in 12 EU Member States, representing over 130.000 professionals engaged in the design and implementation of energy-efficiency solutions.

In this context, Energy Efficiency Services will be key to effectively reduce energy consumption and emissions from the building sector, which accounts for half of the energy consumption in Europe. Energy Efficiency Services provide energy management solutions at the levels of both demand and supply, with long-term contractual arrangements often including an energy performance guarantee. Operation and maintenance over the implementation of the contractually agreed energy efficiency improvement are also key to ensure actual and continuous energy and emissions’ savings.  The latest TEG’s Taxonomy report, which includes recommendations to the European Commission on the adoption of the first delegated act on Sustainable Finance, recognises that such solutions are sustainable and thus should be eligible under the Taxonomy.  The Technical Annex to the report, lists indeed typical energy efficiency services, such as energy performance contracting (EPC), in the section on “Individual measures and professional services” contributing to climate change mitigation in the building sector.

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EurActiv, 25 Jun 2020: The Renovation Wave: an opportunity to scale-up real energy savings through energy management