The European Commission has announced the opening of public consultation on boosting the renovation of buildings across the EU. The Renovation Wave initiative is a priority under the European Green Deal and the Recovery play for the EU, aimed at increasing the rate and quality of the renovation of existing buildings and thereby help decarbonize the building stock. Given the relatively labor-intensive nature of renovation work and the way in which this matches the 'green, digital and resilient' ambition of the Commission recovery package, the Next Generation EU Communication talks of regulatory and financial support to at least doubling the annual renovation rate of the existing building stock.

The consultation will be open for four weeks with the aim of gathering views and input from a broad range of stakeholders, including national, regional and local authorities, businesses, unions, civil society organizations, education organizations, consumer groups, research and innovation organizations, as well as individual citizens. This will then feed into the Commission deliberations on this initiative. The Commission has confirmed the intention to publish in the autumn a strategic communication and an action plan with concrete measures to deploy faster and deeper renovation.

In addition to cutting emissions, the renovation will lead to reduced energy consumption (and lower household bills), safer and healthier buildings, as well as addressing energy poverty and improving people’s quality of life. In employment terms, renovation will also stimulate numerous local, skilled jobs (especially for SMEs), and thereby also deliver clear benefits to the local economy. The Renovation Wave initiative puts the focus on existing buildings and renovation with a lower level of inconvenience for people living in the buildings being renovated.

The deadline to submit the response is July 09, 2020. You can participate in public consultation here.