Posted: January 25, 2025
Photo: IEA SHC Task 71
How can energy regulations shape the building sector's transition to a sustainable society? This was one of the questions discussed during the workshop organized by the IEA SHC Task 71 on Life Cycle and Cost Assessment of Solar Heating and Cooling Technologies that took place on 8 October 2024 in Copenhagen, Denmark. To establish a framework for such highly relevant discussions, the task 71 team has put together a report grouping relevant standards and regulations addressing heating systems, the energy efficiency in buildings, district heating and renewable energies. The 45-page report titled Regulations for Heating Systems starts with a general overview of EU-regulations, directives, and eco-labels. It then contains tables with regulations from eleven countries – Austria, China, Denmark, France, Germany, India, Italy, Netherlands, Portugal, Spain and Switzerland. The report will be available for download in the coming weeks here https://task71.iea-shc.org/publications
An interesting mix of 80 stakeholders from EU administration and associations as well as industry representatives took part in the hybrid workshop in Denmark. “There are a growing number of sustainable management experts in Europe who are used to working with sets of 20 different parameters to carry out a life cycle analyses (LCA). But end customers will not be able to interpret such data sets”, said Karl-Anders Weiß, summarizing the workshop discussions. He is the Manager of Task 71 and a researcher at the German institute Fraunhofer ISE.
During the workshop the experts agreed that it is necessary to develop tools that allow an easy direct comparison of heating solutions for given buildings. To achieve this, assessment methods need to be further developed. Easy-to-handle and understandable parameters also need to be created.
Tables with country-specific regulations allow a comparative overview
Each country section in the above-mentioned report briefly describes the general national strategy and goals. It also includes a table grouping regulations addressing the three cornerstones: energy efficiency in buildings, district heating and cooling, and renewable energy.
The specific regulations in the countries vary considerably regarding intention, content, administration, and fulfilment requirements, even in Europe where basic legislation and common goals are defined by the European Union. Some countries focus on building-related regulations with an emphasis on energy efficiency. Others have developed a regulatory system which also specifies qualities of specific technologies or energy types to be used. Often a proportion of renewable energy is defined as mandatory. Typically, the regulations include transitional periods which can be very long: up to more than a decade.
The drafting process of this first Task 71 report was a joint effort of 16 experts who delivered the filled-in national templates. The author team sees the report as a living document in which the regulations can be updated when changes occur.
Cross-task discussions: Presenting results in a comparable way
“There is great interest in the results of our task from representatives of other IEA Technology Collaboration Programmes related to PV, district heating, heat pumps, storage etc,” said Weiß. The other TCPs can benefit from the discussion on methods for ecological footprint assessment within Task 71. The experts decided to create two different info sheets per technology and country, one for the demand system and one for the supply system (see scheme above). Furthermore, the Task 71 team creates generic supply systems, for example a typical heat pump system for a single-family house, so there will be no conflicts with confidential data from manufacturers. The aim is to present the results for different technologies in a comparable way. “We will certainly share and discuss our results with representatives of other TCPs to achieve a common understanding and approach regarding life cycle analysis,” confirmed Weiß.
Task 71 will finish at the end of 2025. All results in the form of fact sheets and reports will be published here: https://task71.iea-shc.org/publications
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