Rapporteur Niels Fuglsang (S&D - Denmark) presented his report on the proposal for a recast of the Energy Efficiency Directive to the Industry, Research and Energy (ITRE) Committee of the European Parliament on Thursday the 3 March 2022. The EED recast proposal was released by the European Commission in July 2021 as part of the first package of proposals of Fit for 55.
Mr. Fuglsang, as rapporteur within the responsible committee, had the responsibility to take the initiative on proposing amendments to the text. During the ITRE Committee meeting he welcomed the proposal by the Commission but said it was necessary to raise ambitions to ensure that energy demand goes down effectively in the coming years. Some of the key issues he wants to amend within the proposal are:
- Raise the energy efficiency target for final energy consumption to 43% to be achieved by 2030 (in comparison to the 36% target proposed by the Commission);
- Introduction of milestones in 2025 and 2027 as intermediate targets towards 2030;
- Expand the definition of 'energy poverty' to households that can't meet basic energy supply needs and guarantee basic levels of comfort & health;
- Strengthen the "energy efficiency first" principle by ensuring that Member States report on the systemic application of the principle within their national energy and climate progress reprots to the Commission;
- Expand the mandatory annual renovation rate of 3% from buildings that are "owned by public bodies" to buildings that are "owned or occupied by public bodies and of tertiary buildings";
- To strengthen the rollout of district heating & cooling he proposed to increase the amount of municipalities that have to setup local heating and cooling plans from municipalities that have a total minimum population 50.000 to those that have a population of 20.000.
Many MEPs supported the amibitions of rapporteur Fuglsang but some others were also more reluctant about the levels of ambitions and will propose to make them more aligned with the Commission's original proposal. Depending on the inter-institutional dialogues, we can expect to have a final text by the European Parliament in Q2 2022.
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The Commission's proposal for the EED recast released in July 2022.