New paper in "Environmental Research: Infrastructure and Sustainability" on real estate decarbonization
The SusTec team of Evan Petkov, Christof Knoeri, and Professor Volker Hoffmann tackled the critical issue of existing building renovations (more technically – energy retrofits) from the perspectives of some of the largest real estate owners in Europe, industry players, and policymakers.
by
Leonie Schoeller
Renovating and modernizing existing buildings – that is, improving energy efficiency and installing renewable energy systems – is a key lever for Net-Zero since 90% of the European building stock will still stand in 2050.
Unfortunately, the rate at which deep renovations are happening is far too slow. The paper tries to answer how can we accelerate deep renovations by:
- Outlining three phases of real estate decarbonization to reach Net-Zero emissions
- Demonstrating how real estate owners can better consider the CO₂ implications of their investment decisions through long-term planning and role priorities
- Showing that, paradoxically, traditional energy and climate policies have limited impact on deep renovations compared to the strong influence of policies from other domains
- Providing a pathway for a broader mix of policies in the building-sector which would account for the holistic objectives of affordability, densification, and decarbonization
- There are still open questions for both real estate owners and policymakers for how to decarbonize the building stock – here we take one step forward in better understanding both of their roles.
Please find the open access link Download here.