UIPI speaking at Parliamentary Hearing on “Smart Buildings and Smart Transport”

On 31 May, the Socialists and Democrats group in the European Parliament organised a Hearing on “Smart buildings and electrification of the transport sector” hosted by MEP Damiano Zoffoli, S&D Shadow Rapporteur for the Environment Committee Opinion on the Energy Performance of Buildings Directive (EPBD) currently under revision. Emmanuelle Causse – Director of European Affairs at UIPI – was invited to speak about “E-mobility: Between ambition and realism” next to a Member of the Cabinet of Commissioner Cañete, representatives of ENER – the Italian energy agency as well as of BMW and smart appliance industry. Emmanuelle Causse pointed out that when shifting the decarbonisation of the transport sector from transport itself to real estate and, more importantly, the housing sector, the Commission needs to carefully assess the proportionality of the measures proposed. The obligations included in the Commission EPBD legislative Proposal will ultimately have an impact on the cost of housing. If requirements for new buildings are feasible, the cost to comply with a pre-cabling obligation for future electromobility deployment will still pile up on top of other obligations and make new buildings more expensive. For existing buildings, UIPI stressed that laying cables for electromobility infrastructure in parking spaces will inevitably compete with more urgent renovation needs. Hence, the necessity to find a cost-effective way to deploy the electromobility infrastructure so as not to jeopardise affordability of housing and in order to gain acceptance at citizen level. UIPI recognised that both the Parliamentary report and the Council’s draft were going in the right direction on this issue by linking the pre-cabling or only ducting requirement to major renovations touching the parking area or the electrical infrastructure. This important differentiation was not included in the Commission’s Proposal.