We are sharing now a new version of the report that divusses policy landscape in the EU and Africa concerning the energy efficiency in buildings and how to tackle thermal comfort in warm climate zones.
The recently released report D2.4 aims to assess some successful or promising policies which might be effective in promoting highly comfortable buildings with minimal energy need for heating and cooling, total primary energy use, and non-renewable energy use, with a particular focus on summer comfort. At the same time we consider also policies and institutional frameworks for the promotion of the use of local, low impact materials.
The focus of the analysis is methodological: the aim is to highlight some key points which might be useful in developing or assessing policies. Some national implementations of the European Energy Performance of Buildings Directive (EPBD) are analyzed according to a set of criteria, e.g.
- uniformity in definition of overall building performance when expressed in terms of energy needs, delivered energy, total or non-renewable primary energy , as univocally defined in EN-ISO 52000 – 2017.
- explicit choice of a comfort model which might favor the use of the bioclimatic approach, with reference to the most recent standards e.g. ASHRAE 55-2020.
- use of physical energy balance rather than a nominal net zero balance over a year.
Gando Primary School, Burkina Faso | Francis Diebedo Kere
For both continents, policies to support bioclimatic architecture will likely have to go beyond the building itself and involve district and city levels. We present a matrix of interaction of policies aimed respectively at building and district level with a view of highlighting the necessary synergies.
As for financing economic incentives and support programmes, the report discusses ways to finance via debt or general taxation, levy on energy carriers, priority of investments with a focus on short term or on reduction of risks and reduction of long term costs.