Integrated home renovation services

Many project promoters – public authorities, individuals or businesses – lack the skills and capacity to set up, implement and finance ambitious low-energy and clean energy building projects. In addition, many project developers still face obstacles in raising the necessary up-front costs for their projects – particularly as the small-size of investments and the lack of turnkey solutions increase implementation cost – and lack access to attractive and adequate financing products from the market.

Scope

This topic aims at creating or replicating innovative local or regional "integrated home renovation services". The developed services should cover the whole "customer journey" from technical and social diagnosis, technical offer, contracting of works, structuring and provision of finance (e.g. loans or EPCs), to the monitoring of works and quality assurance. Such integrated services should be operational at the end of the project and create more demand for holistic approaches as a result of improved offer by trustful market operators and better awareness from homeowners. They should also support the streamlining of standards and practices into consistent and transparent processes investors can rely on, and by doing so help connect the supply of finance with demand for it.

Proposals should build upon the promising experiences of integrated renovation services emerging in Europe and aim at developing / improving economically viable business models, ultimately running without the need for public subsidies.

Projects funded under this topic will optimise the services required along the renovation process (based on a thorough analysis of the local needs and actors in place), improve trust and awareness of homeowners towards such services, reduce renovation costs and time on-site through standardised approaches (e.g. optimized business processes, standardised contractual arrangements, , branding of the proposed services, …), mainstreaming innovative technical solutions adapted to the local context, help improve their legal and regulatory environment, and overall improve financing conditions for energy renovation.

The services can be developed through dedicated operators (new public or public/private entity or mandated private operator) and/or through an improved co-ordination between existing local actors.

The Commission considers that proposals requesting a contribution from the EU of between EUR 0.5 and 1.5 million would allow this specific challenge to be addressed appropriately. Nonetheless, this does not preclude submission and selection of proposals requesting other amounts.

Expected Impact

Proposals are expected to demonstrate the impacts listed below, using quantified indicators and targets wherever possible:

• Implementation and upscale of economically viable business models, ultimately running without the need for public subsidies. Data evidence made available to market actors. Proof of the replication of these initiatives by other market actors;
• Availability of adequate financing offer for integrated renovation services;
• Strong and trustworthy partnerships with local actors (e.g. SMEs, ESCOs, financial institutions, energy agencies, NGOs) and quality of the proposed services recognized by market actors;
• Development of large, locally-developed investment pipelines for home renovation, connecting the supply of finance with demand for it (in million Euro of investments within the first 5 years);
• Uptake of home energy renovation at local level and corresponding primary energy savings triggered (in GWh/year).

Additional positive effects can be quantified and reported when relevant and wherever possible:

• Reduction of the greenhouse gases emissions (in tCO2-eq/year) and/or air pollutants (in kg/year) triggered by the project.

Cross-cutting Priorities

• Clean Energy
• Socio-economic science and humanities