Green houses, Brussels sets plans for renovations in motion

An articulated programme, made up of the necessary resources, collected fromEuropean and national funds, and a year-by-year planning of the renovations to be carried out.

The European Commission has just published theguidelines that are to guide member states in drafting national plans for the renovation of their buildings. These plans will be at the heart of the implementation of the green houses directive (the Energy performance of buildings directive) and, according to the indications coming from Brussels, they will have to be particularly thorough.

The directive - it should be remembered - only sets macroscopic targets that the member states must then decide how to implement. The achievement of these objectives (the reduction in energy consumption of residential buildings by 16% by 2030 and 20-22% by 2035, before the 2050 deadline) must, however, be monitored by the European Commission: this is what the plans are for.

They will have to be presented by the end of 2025 in their first version. Then, the Commission will have six months to examine them and publish country-specific recommendations, modelled on what happens in economic policy. On the basis of these recommendations, governments will decide whether to update their plans, and then present thefinal version by 31 December 2026. This lengthy process will tell, above all, how much money different countries plan to spend on the energy efficiency of their buildings. Significant numbers in Italy, after the great concentration of investment that has characterised the superbonus.

The plans will have to contain the projected investment needs for therenovation of buildings from now until 2030 and then from four years to 2050. Both public and private buildings are to be identified. And, in a section on coverage, it will be necessary to explain how much will be paid with state resources, when with European funds and how much with regional and local funds. A share of the financing will be recovered from private individuals, including loans, mortgages and forms of partnership. Member countries will be able to provide forms of fiscal incentive or simply administrative incentives to encourage the redevelopment of buildings.