Refurbishing apartments and houses in Latvia and Bulgaria: levers and brakes

This paper investigates levers and brakes for carrying out energy effective retrofits in private dwellings in Latvia and in Bulgaria. In both countries, 24 home owners occupying either their apartment or their single family house, were interviewed in 2009-10 about their energy-saving renovation works and their justifications, both in cities and in the countryside. The paper begins with a description of the building stock in the two countries. Both have a large proportion of apartments (46 % of apartments in Bulgaria and 77 % in Latvia) and have many old buildings, more than half of the buildings dating from the sixties or before. People can live in these allotted dwellings for their lifetime or even pass them on to kin. The main part of the paper analyses the levers and brakes in refurbishing one’s dwelling according to the interviewees, for apartments and houses in both countries. It appears that in Latvia, the dwellings’ bad condition is the first motivation for renovating them. In apartments, dwellers renovate because they are “feeling cold” in their dwellings, which is always related to their bad insulation. In Bulgaria, the desire to have and maintain normal and comfortable living conditions is the first motivation expressed by the owners interviewed. In both countries, lack of money is the main brake in not doing energy-related renovation works. Levers and brakes discussed include the role and impact of professional actors, renovation programs, as well as energy labels