Specific Challenge:

Under the Energy Performance of Buildings Directive, all EU countries have established independent energy performance certification systems supported by independent mechanisms of control and verification. However, current practices and tools of energy performance assessment and certification applied across Europe face a number of challenges.

Assessment processes and certificates have to become more reliable, user-friendly, cost-effective, have comparable good quality and be compliant with EU legislation in order to instil trust in the market and incite investments in energy efficient buildings. They have to increasingly reflect the smart dimension of buildings and at the same time, facilitate convergence of quality and reliability of Energy Performance Certificates (EPCs) across the EU. The building energy performance methodologies should also ensure a technology neutral approach, be transparently presented making use of International and European standards, in particular the ISO/CEN standards developed under Commission mandate M/480 aimed at enabling the presentation of national and regional choices on a comparable basis.

Next-generation energy performance assessment schemes will value buildings in a holistic and cost-effective manner across several complimentary dimensions: envelope performances, system performances and smart readiness (i.e. the ability of buildings to be smartly monitored and controlled and, to get involved in demand-side management strategies). The assessment should be based on an agreed list of parameters/indicators, such as e.g. calculated annual final energy use, share of renewable energy used, past (climate corrected) final energy consumptions and energy expenditure, comfort levels or the level of smartness. The assessment methods should increasingly take into account output measures of performance (actual measured data) making use of available and increasing number of building energy related data from sensors, smart meters, connected devices etc.. These new schemes should contribute to improving the effectiveness of certificates, by demonstrating how these could be strengthen, modernised and best linked to integrated national/regional certification schemes within a framework that aids compliance checking and effectiveness of financial support.

Scope:

2018 (Coordination and support action):

Proposals should involve relevant stakeholders (including national and regional certification bodies) to stimulate and enable the roll-out of next-generation of energy performance assessment and certification, with a view to achieve enhanced reliability, cost-effectiveness and compliance with relevant EU standards and the Energy Performance of Buildings Directive. Proposals should develop strategies to encourage convergence of EPC practices and tools across the EU so as to ensure a comparable level of high quality, independent control and verification. The applicability of assessment and the certification schemes should be assessed through a broad set of well-targeted and realistic cases, featuring various locations, building types, climatic conditions and field practices including existing national EPC schemes. The assessment will aim at demonstrating the potential of an EU-wide uptake of the proposed assessment and certification schemes, along well-defined criteria. Embedding the EPCs and their recommendations in broader concepts such as energy audits, wider-buildings related databases (e.g. national EPC databases, national housing surveys, EU Building Stock Observatory) and one-stop-shops including administrative, financial and supply side information and linking EPCs to related concepts such as buildings renovation passports, individual buildings renovation roadmaps or building logbooks should also be considered.

The Commission considers that proposals requesting a contribution from the EU of between EUR 1 and 2 million would allow this specific challenge to be addressed appropriately. Nonetheless, this does not preclude submission and selection of proposals requesting other amounts.

2019 (Innovation action):

Proposals should address the definition and demonstration of innovative approaches for the assessment of building energy performance, focusing at first on the reliable assessment of building intrinsic performances (e.g. using inverse modelling) but working also towards output-based assessments using available building energy related data. Proposals should involve relevant stakeholders (including national and regional certification bodies). The proposed approaches should be more reliable as well as cost-effective and compliant with relevant EU standards, in order to allow for an EU-wide deployment. Such approaches should rely on the combination of existing and proven technology components (starting from TRL 6-7, please see part G of the General Annexes) with well-structured methodologies and protocols that can lead to the definition of new certification schemes. They could also consider implications when using EPCs in building passports and renovation roadmaps.

The Commission considers that proposals requesting a contribution from the EU of between EUR 2 and 2.5 million would allow this specific challenge to be addressed appropriately. Nonetheless, this does not preclude submission and selection of proposals requesting other amounts.

This topic contributes to the roadmap of the Energy-efficient Buildings (EeB) cPPP.

Expected Impact:

2018 (Coordination and support action):

Proposals are expected to demonstrate, depending on the scope addressed, the impacts listed below using quantified indicators and targets wherever possible:

• Primary energy savings triggered by the project (in GWh/year);
• Investments in sustainable energy triggered by the project (in million Euro);
• Increased convergence of good quality and reliable energy performance assessment and certification and uptake and compliance with EU Directives and related standards;
• Increased rate of application and compliance of EPCs and independent control systems with the provisions of EU and national legislation, in a defined region;
• Increase of EPCs databases for compliance checking and verification, linking with financing schemes and building stock characteristics research etc.

2019 (Innovation action):

Proposals are expected to demonstrate, depending on the scope addressed, the impacts listed below using quantified indicators and targets wherever possible:

• Improved user-friendliness of EPCs in terms clarity and accuracy of the information provided;
• Enhanced user awareness of building energy efficiency;
• Primary energy savings triggered by the project (in GWh/year);
• Investments in sustainable energy triggered by the project (in million Euro).

Additional positive effects can be quantified and reported when relevant and wherever possible:

• Reduction of the greenhouse gases emissions (in tCO₂-eq/year) and/or air pollutants (in kg/year) triggered by the project.

Types of action:	CSA Coordination and support action
DeadlineModel:  Opening date:	single-stage 25 January 2018	Deadline:	04 September 2018
Types of action:	IA Innovation action
DeadlineModel:  Opening date:	single-stage 24 January 2019	Deadline:	03 September 2019

Source: Horizon 2020 – The European Commission