Towards energy-efficient buildings in Europe

The New Energy Policy was adopted by the European Council in spring 2007 (EC2008). Later in December, 2008 the European Parliament adopted a number of measures designed to: establish a new energy policy, combat climate change, and boost the EU’s energy security and competitiveness. This integrated climate change and energy policy (EU 2002) aims to ensure that Europe has a sustainable future based on a low-carbon, energy-efficient economy. The ambitious targets of the agreement were identical with the Action Plan on the energy-efficiency of European Commission that introduced the goal to limit raise of the global average temperature to 2°C, compared to pre-industrial level (EU2007a). To achieve this, the EU is promoting a goal of 30% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by 2020, compared to 1990 levels, in developed countries. Further, it has made an independent commitment to achieve at least 20% reduction. The targets for various measures up to 2020 in the EU include: - 20% improvement of energy-efficiency of cars, buildings and appliances, and especially - 30% reduction of final energy use of buildings - 20% share of renewable energy in average - 10% share of biofuels - ≈0% emissions of new power plants.European Science Foundation - COS