On October 26, the French and German governments circulated a paper on the future Renewable Energy Directive, as part of the negotiating process occurring between the European Commission, the Council and the Parliament.

The paper touches on the different issues at stake with the revision of the Directive, and it is particularly interesting when it comes to the heating and cooling section, giving thus an indication of those countries’ negotiating position.

According to the paper, the Directive should set general objectives, and leave greater freedom to Member States on the way to achieve them. It should take into account a comprehensive assessment of the potential for renewable energies in the heating and cooling sector.

In particular, the improvement of energy efficiency and the integration of renewable energies and waste heat recovery is a major issue for the building sector. The goal should be to implement a twofold strategy of reducing consumption of final energy while simultaneously increasing the share of renewable energy sources in the remaining final energy consumption at the same time.

The Directive should include efficient cooling systems from RES to achieve the overall target, and define criteria for an efficient district cooling. It should continue to foster efforts of Member States to raise the professionals’ awareness of energy efficiency and renewable heating and cooling technologies by communication efforts and to support schemes to promote/finance corresponding qualification/training measures. Finally, research and development should be encouraged for new emerging renewable energies using technologies with high energy efficiency and low air quality impact.

In order to access the full paper, please click here.