Understanding EU buildings energy performance key to better policies and delivery
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Last modified by the author on 23/09/2016 - 09:50
The European Commission (EC) recognises the need for high-quality building stock data as a key precondition to reach its 2050 decarbonisation goals. In the current draft proposal for a revised Directive on the energy performance of buildings (EPBD), the EC introduces new obligations to mend the data gaps. A newly launched EU-funded project, ExcEED, promises to establish a robust and durable return of knowledge mechanism collecting actual buildings energy performance data and providing information to policy makers, designers, and energy managers.
The EPBD proposal points to a will to strengthen the role of Energy Performance Certificates (EPCs) in evaluating and monitoring energy consumption as well as introducing a requirement to set up national databases or registries. However, no detailed plan has been prepared. Article 8 lays down requirements regarding building automation and energy monitoring systems on top of the development of a smartness indicator.
Thus, the EU Commission recognises that there is an unavoidable need to learn from what has been recently built, to improve the quality and the performances of the future building sector. This is where the ExcEED project may support by taking the pulse of the real energy consumed by the building stock. ExcEED aims to develop a European energy efficiency database collecting meaningful data from buildings and districts, and making them available to decision-makers, commercial stakeholders and researchers, in order to advance knowledge and improve the efficiency of the building sector.
Moreover, the project will answer the need for transparency and comparability of energy performance calculations. The database and tools to be developed over the next three years will offer insights to support decision-making and point to weaknesses that a building or cluster of buildings might have as well as measuring the impact of certain technologies.
Key performance indicators will be developed to quantify and benchmark the energy efficiency and the environmental quality at building and district level. The ExcEED database and tools are meant to support building managers, designers, citizens, industry and policy makers to pull together the knowledge looked-for to create an energy efficient, healthy and comfortable built environment.
More information on the project and its reach will be made available in the coming weeks at:
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