Barriers and Needs for Energy-Efficient Refurbishment at District Level

This paper aims to address the need and barriers involved in the development for energy-efficient refurbishment at the district level and making conclusions about the need for improved processes. By district-level refurbishment, we mean concurrent renovation of several buildings in a same district/neighbourhood with the view to achieving cost savings, financial benefits and a more efficient use of Renewable Energy Sources (RES). Also, full optimization and performance of the nearly zero energy buildings (nZEBs) require aspects such as the
consideration of load-matching and grid interaction. District-level refurbishment projects may enable a better understanding of these aspects. On the other hand there may also be significant barriers related to several factors such as legal issues regarding town planning and building permission practices; legal issues regarding practices, taxes and fees of energy generation; presence of several owners; simultaneous presence of several actors including energy companies; lack of actors able to initiate and integrate; lack of business models for profitable work in district-level projects; lack of experience in using collaborative delivery models; lack of tools for energy assessment at district level; lack of process descriptions for district-level refurbishment, and lack of design methods for optimization of grid interaction and load matching.
To understand these barriers, interviews in eight European countries were conducted. The results show that most of the questions addressed are relevant to at least to some extent. Different actors in various European regions
emphasize somewhat different aspects. However, the most significant problem was found to be the involvement of many owners in district-level refurbishment projects with differing interests and their difficulty in forming an agreement. Related to this, the lack of actors who would initiate the project and motivate owners, and other stakeholders were also imperative. Besides, current legislation causes significant hindrances for refurbishment at the district level in many countries.