Thirty years of action for energy efficiency in buildings: what are the results?

In the autumn of 1973 a first energy crisis swept over the industrialized world. In 1979 a second followed. The first reactions in the West reflected panic, but soon a correcting policy emerged with rational use of energy as one of the corner stones. From the beginning, buildings got special attention. Their share in the annual national end energy consumption, in fact, was unexpectedly high, while less consumption of highly valued energy sources looked affordable without jeopardizing building usability. On the contrary, better was possible with less.

One may expect that three decennia later, the results of such policy should be visible in terms of less energy consumed in buildings. This is not the case, at least not in Flanders, Belgium. Many reasons explain that anomaly. The average principal, designer, builder and contractor is not interested in energy efficiency. Investment costs and not future annual costs are the main concern. Legislation has been introduced reflecting a far too optimistic view on citizenship and thus, without any enforcement policy. The housing and tertiary building stock still expands, with a clear prosperity-linked trend towards detached dwellings with low compactness and large floor area. Urban planning remains business as usual. And finally, policy makers forgot to consider rebound effects and the impact of lazy workmanship when predicting the efficiency of fabric and building services related measures, resulting in an overestimation of future avoided energy use, while at the same time they underestimated the inertia of such large system as the existing building stock, given the low retrofit and substitution rate.