On Tuesday 19 December, the negotiators of the Estonian Presidency of the Council of the EU, the European Parliament - led by their rapporteur, Bendt Bendtsen (EPP, Denmark) - and the Commission reached a political agreement in principle on the revised directive on the energy performance of buildings.
The Council of the EU adopted its general approach on 6 June (see EUROPE 11816) and the Parliament adopted its position on 11 October (see EUROPE 11881) on this text, which was proposed by the Commission in November 2016 in the framework of the package of measures for clean energy (see EUROPE 11679).
In particular, the obligation for Member States to define long-term renovation strategies for existing buildings has been introduced, according to a Council statement. In new non-residential buildings with more than 10 parking spaces, a charging station for electric vehicles will have to be put in place every 5 parking spaces.
The improvements to the text agreed upon between the three institutions include measures aiming to reinforce the energy performance of new buildings, speed up the pace of refurbishment for existing buildings to make them lower-energy and to make the most of the enormous potential of energy efficiency gains in the construction sector, the largest consumer of energy in Europe.
On Tuesday evening, the Commission welcomed the agreement, which marks the end of the first of its eight legislative proposals of the clean energy package (see EUROPE 11679). (Original version in French by Emmanuel Hagry)