Financing schemes for deep energy renovation of multifamily apartment buildings are of particular importance, as the access to financing and equal participation in renovation projects has been often quoted as one of the main barriers to the tangible improvement of the energy performance of the residential building stock in the EU. This barrier is particularly relevant in Central and Eastern Europe, given the high share of energy poor households and the distributed ownership of the apartments in the residential buildings, which increases the complexity of whole-building renovation projects with market financing.
In order to address these barriers, ComAct provided a detailed description of new or adapted financing schemes providing increased accessibility for energy-poor households, promoted for further implementation either as stand-alone instruments or in combination with other existing financing programs in the five pilot contries. The descriptions include technical, social and financial assessments delivered by the local partners, including descriptions of the institutional framework and identification of gaps and bottlenecks which have to be addressed in the implementation process.
This report presents financing schemes for deep energy renovation of multifamily apartment buildings in the 5 ComAct pilot countries – Bulgaria, Republic of North Macedonia, Hungary, Lithuania and Ukraine, selected by the relevant project partners as the most suitable to increase the scope and rate of the renovation programmes, while at the same time taking into consideration the interests and needs of the energy poor households.
The analysis, developed after the compilation of the ComAct toolbox, revealed that despite similarities in the building stock and ownership models, different financing approaches are applied because of the differences in the legal framework, financial capacities, local experiences and even “the energy culture” of the society. In most of the cases, however, “energy poverty” is still not widely understood as different than social vulnerability. This would require higher advocacy efforts and collaborative engagement of public and private financing institutions to help those households who, burdened with excessive energy costs, experience difficulties to provide resources to secure their share in the renovation programmes.
To this aim, the proposed financing schemes are expected to steer the local dialogues in this direction, building on the new requirements of the proposal for a new Energy Performance of Buildings Directive promoting the common EU definition for energy poverty and the minimum renovation standards as key for the achievement of the new and more ambitious energy efficiency targets stipulated by the European Climate Law.
