Across entire regions, national renovation plans are also adding up to epoch-defining investments. Peter Robl, our Public Affairs Manager for Eastern Europe, says: “Our preliminary analysis shows that Eastern European countries intend to allocate €15 billion to renovation and the new construction of buildings.
“This will generate substantial investment in addition to the status quo. Governments must now properly design and implement their schemes to ensure good uptake and deliver the respective energy savings and climate action.”
Knauf Insulation can help
At the time of writing, several countries have still to file their plans to the European Commission and others still need support with their renovation component.
Katarzyna adds: “Although some countries have already announced detailed and promising proposals for renovation, unfortunately not all Member States have created precise reforms and investment plans for their building stock. There is still time to do so before April 30. And at Knauf Insulation, we are here to help.”
Focus on buildings that need renovation most
Residential and social housing, hospitals, schools, care homes, there are hundreds of thousands of public buildings in Europe that should be prioritised for renovation.
In France a total of €9.2 billion has been dedicated to renovation with €4 billion for public buildings, €2.1 billion for health buildings and €2.5 billion for private and social housing.
Source expertise to make renovation a reality
“For energy renovation in particular, Member States have been leaving money on the table, because they are ill-equipped to apply for it properly,” says Adrian Joyce, Campaign Director of Renovate Europe, of which Knauf Insulation is a partner.
Technical Assistance is a wealth enabler for buildings, says Adrian, citing the example of the draft Czechia National Recovery and Resilience Plan which allocates money to Technical Assistance for building renovation. The Commission’s RECOVER Taskforce is also there to help.
To help Member States, the European Commission also recommends establishing one-stop renovation shops that tackle the whole customer journey from information and technical assistance to financial schemes and the auditing of energy savings.
Make performance a priority
To make a historic impact, national renovation programmes have to deliver quantifiable results.
This means setting and ensuring standards that document the installation of quality materials as well as incentivising — and auditing — high performance workmanship.
Our sister company Knauf Energy Solutions, has vast experience at scaling up quality renovations in Belgium and the UK as well as providing quantifiable before and after results.
Scale up successful initiatives
Renovation is not just about quality. It is also about quantity. It is vital that building renovation is scaled up.