Dear Reader,

Welcome to the 7th newsletter from the EU Funded Project RenoZEB.

In spite of the COVID-19 crisis, the RenoZEB consortium managed to carry on with the demonstration buildings, which are more or less half way through their retrofitting process. Meanwhile the rest of the consortium partners are working on the final tasks of the project to demonstrate and validate the RenoZEB project results and impacts inside the Near to Zero Energy Building (nZEB) market. The next newsletter in September will be our final one and we are already looking forward to presenting you the results of our four year efforts.

Stay tuned with our latest news and video and have a nice reading!

The RenoZEB team

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The renovation of the multi-apartment demo building in Vöru is nearing completion. The goal is to raise the energy label from the existing energy label “E” (231 kWh/m2 a) to label “B” (124 kWh/m2 a) - which is now a reached target.

The indoor climate of the building was well improved thanks to a new ventilation system with heat recovery, new heating, and domestic hot water system. A new PV system will now cover energy needs and lowering management costs of inhabitants.

The pilot renovation project was validated in Voru (Estonia) thanks to a new systemic approach that includes an innovative prefabricated plug-and-play modular façade. The facade system was designed by Focchi and worked out within an international team of engineers, specialists, and technicians.

Read more here.

RenoZEB partner Architects’ Council of Europe (ACE) is producing the podcast 'Architects in EU research', a series of interviews with several architects who share their professional journey in the architectural world and how they got involved in EU-funded Projects on innovation and education. In the third episode of the podcast, Dr Veronika Schröpfer (ACE Head of EU Research Projects) interviewed RenoZEB project partner Ane Ferreiro Sistiaga (architect at CYPE Software) on the RenoZEB plug&play technologies.

Listen to the podcast at this link.

In October 2020 the European Commission launched the Renovation Wave Strategy, an initiative aiming at reducing the energy performance of the EU building stock and at least doubling the renovation rates by 2030. As mentioned by the Commission, ‘buildings are responsible for about 40% of the EU’s energy consumption, and 36% of greenhouse gas emissions from energy. But only 1% of buildings undergo energy-efficient renovation every year, so effective action is crucial to making Europe the first climate-neutral continent by 2050’. Read more here.

Discover the results of the survey “Property owners’ capacity and readiness to renovate” that obtained a representative sample at the EU level and provides important insights on how to create adapted policies to boost the Renovation Wave.

The International Union of Property Owners (UIPI) conducted an online survey to assess European property owners’ capacity and willingness to renovate their homes. The goal was to assess whether property owners in Europe were considering/planning renovations before COVID-19 – and if so, what were they planning and why; and if not, why not – and the impact of COVID-19 on these renovation plans. The analysis of the collected data from over 10,000 respondents in 36 European countries allows to shed light on the real situation of property owners and guide future policy recommendations aiming to enable the Renovation Wave and meet EU climate goals.

Access the full report here.

ReCO2ST addresses the challenges of nZEB refurbishment through a systemic 3 step approach: Initially a Refurbishment Assessment Tool (RAT) is deployed to create refurbishment scenarios, empowering the decision making of the building owner, public or private. Then Action Plans for the renovation are formed through Integrated Project Delivery (IPD), and finally a refurbishment package of innovative and customizable technologies is installed (Retrofit-Kit) for personalised renovation. 

RenoZEB is happy to collaborate with ReCO2ST on tackling the European renovation wave!

Read more about the project here.