Passive House for municipalities [ ]

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====== Passive House for municipalities ======


//**Welcome to the Passive House for municipalities section! \\  \\ This section will present information to provide support to municipal decision-makers \\ who are looking for solutions to improve climate protection at the municipal level, \\ from the building sector perspective. ** // 

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===== Climate protection at municipal level =====

Climate change affects us all. In order to effectively tackle climate change, we must reduce our energy consumption significantly in the long term. This means efficient use of available energy and placing maximum priority on saving energy. Cities and local authorities are important actors when it comes to climate protection – at the local level, with every individual, every community, in every region.

On average, about 40 % of the total energy consumption in industrialized countries is used for buildings. That is why significant improvement of the energy efficiency of buildings has considerable impact on the overall assessment of a town, municipality or urban district in terms of energy. Due to the long service life of buildings, a consistent approach is especially important in this respect.

For more than 20 years, the Passive House Institute has committed itself to the advancement of the Passive House Standard, with which an improvement of 40 to 75 % in the energy consumption for heating and cooling of new builds can be achieved; in the case of refurbishments, reductions of 75 to 95 % are commonplace.

[{{ :picopen:bahnstadt_hd_ph_kommunen.png?450|Picture: A whole city district in Passive House standard: the new "Bahnstadt“ in Heidelberg.}}]


==== 10-point plan ====

The Passive House Institute has compiled the following __10 points__ to support and to trigger effective climate protection measures in the building sector at the local level:

  - [[:municipalities:1ph_legislation_new_builds|]]
  - [[:municipalities:2_local_land|]]
  - [[:municipalities:3_municipal_urban_planning|]]
  - [[:municipalities:4_municipal_housing_companies|]]
  - [[:municipalities:5_financial_incentives|]]
  - [[:municipalities:6_municipal_quality_assurance|]]
  - [[:municipalities:7_climate_neutral_urban_districts|]]
  - [[:municipalities:8_information_and_dissemination|]]
  - [[:municipalities:9_energy_saving_technologies|]]
  - [[:municipalities:10_communication_ph_and_renewables|]]\\

The points above are based on the [[http://www.passivehouse-international.org/download.php?cms=1&file=2014_02_13_Municipal_Climate_Protection_Press_Release.pdf/|position paper]] of the Passive House Institute regarding the use of Passive House technology as a contribution to climate protection in the building sector for cities and communities by Wolfgang Feist, March 2014. Originally published as part of the EU funded [[http://www.passreg.eu/|PassREg]] project.\\

{{:picopen:newco-funded-iee-horiz.jpg?250|newco-funded-iee-horiz.jpg}}[[http://www.passreg.eu/|{{:picopen:logo_passreg.png?nolink&200}}]]\\

|//The sole responsibility for the content lies with the authors. \\ While certain marked articles have been created with the support of the EU, they do not necessarily reflect the opinion of the European Union; \\ Neither the EACI nor the European Commission are responsible for any use that may be made of the information contained therein.// |

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==== Financial incentives policy ====

Some guiding principles for effective approaches for financial incentives:

  * Use given opportunities: "If you do it, do it right“.
  * Quality is decisive, less important is when this quality is implemented!
  * Focus on grants for individual measures (based on an overall concept for the building).
  * Achieve improvement of the comfort and quality of existing buildings step by step via individual measures / via grants for individual measures
  * Support the clients via Passive House Designers and Passive House Tradespersons.
  * Give grants for a third-party (neutral!) quality assurance.

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=====  Municipalities lead the way: examples and case studies =====

The international Passive House Association (iPHA) has assembled a list of cities and administrative districts that stipulate the Passive House standard in their building regulations. The list also includes details on financial support available for Passive House projects in certain countries. Read more on iPHA's collection on[[https://www.passivehouse-international.org/index.php?page_id=501
|Passive House Legislation & Funding]]

Some examples are documented in more detail here on Passipedia: 

  * The Commonwealth of **Massachusetts** in the US has a building energy code which allows municipalities within Massachusetts to mandate Passive House for new residential buildings.  Read more about [[policy:Massachusettes|Mandatory Passive House – The Massachusetts Story]]. 

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====== See also ======

[[:eu_projects_publications|Overview ]]of all articles that have been written within the framework of the [[http://www.passreg.eu/|PassREg]] project