Recast EPBD – Legal Background and Implementation

EU directives deeply influence REHVA members’ daily work. It underlines the need for effective REHVA technical advocacy towards policy makers. This article provides a resume on the legal background, EU key actors, policy structure and mechanism and the difficulties of assessing the correct implementation.

Legal background

Types of legislative acts

There are several types of legislative acts. This document is focusing on the followings:

Regulation

A regulation is a legislative act that is binding in its entirety. It is directly applicable in all Member States. National governments do not have to transpose it into their own legal systems.

This ensures consistency. The rules are exactly the same in every country and can be enforced immediately.

An example is the Regulation (EU) 2024/1781 on the Ecodesign for Sustainable Products Regulation (ESPR).

Directive

A directive is binding as to the outcome to be achieved, while leaving Member States to decide how to deliver it. One example is the Energy Performance of Buildings Directive (EPBD) (EU) 2024/1275, which targets a fully decarbonised building stock by 2050 but allows national authorities to choose the form and methods to meet that objective.

Directives must be incorporated (transposed) by the EU countries into their national legislation. This is done by the government in a legislative process by submitting a bill to the national parliament.

Once the parliament has adopted the necessary legislation, the government notifies the European Commission. The Commission then checks whether the directive has been implemented correctly and on time. If not, it can take enforcement action.

Each directive contains a deadline by which EU countries must incorporate its provisions into their national legislation and inform the Commission to that effect.

At the EPBD Expert Group meeting on 24 February 2026, Member States were asked whether they expected to notify complete national transposition measures by the general deadline of 29 May 2026.

The results were as follows:

Delegated and implementing acts

Most EU legislative acts contain provisions enabling the Commission to adopt delegated or implementing acts. Empowering the Commission to take decisions under delegated or implementing acts might be necessary in case technical updates or when uniform application is needed in the Member States.

Delegated acts

Delegated acts give the Parliament a strong say. It can block any delegated act before it enters into force, and it can also strip the Commission of the power to adopt delegated acts at any point — without needing the agreement of the Council to do so. Both institutions hold this power equally and independently of one another.

In the EPBD, examples of delegated acts are: the revised cost-optimality framework (Article 6, due by 30 June 2025) and the Union framework for calculating the life-cycle global warming potential of buildings (Article 7, due by 31 December 2025). These are not minor technical details: the cost-optimality framework shapes how Member States define minimum energy performance requirements, while the GWP framework will determine how embodied carbon in buildings is measured and reported across the EU.

Implementing acts

Implementing acts tell a different story. Real control sits with the Member States, who scrutinise the Commission’s proposals through specialised committees. If a committee rejects a proposal by a qualified majority, the Commission must revise it or refer it to a higher-level appeal committee — where the Council can intervene decisively. Parliament, by contrast, has no seat at the table and no formal power to block. It can pass resolutions urging the Commission to reconsider, but these carry no legal weight. In the EPBD, examples include the Smart Readiness Indicator for large non-residential buildings (Article 15) and the interoperability requirements for access to building systems’ data (Article 16, due by 31 December 2025) — both areas of direct relevance to the heating and cooling sector.

The decision whether to use a delegated or an implementing act must be made during the legislative procedure and cannot easily be undone afterwards. For industry and associations active in EU policy, this makes early engagement essential — before the text is finalised and the balance of oversight is locked in.

Submission of a legislative proposal

The Commission holds the “right of initiative”. Therefore, the legislative procedure starts with the submission by the Commission of a proposal for a legislative act.

With the Treaty of Lisbon, the co-decision became the general rule for adopting legislation at EU level. A legislative act is based on the principle of parity between:

·         the European Parliament, directly-elected and representing the people of the Union,

·         the Council, representing the governments of Member States.

Based on a legislative proposal made by the Commission, the two co-legislators adopt the legislation jointly. Neither of them can adopt the legislation without the agreement of the other, and both co-legislators have to approve an identical text.

If a legislative proposal is rejected at any stage of the procedure, the proposal is not adopted and the procedure ends.

There are different steps for agreeing or rejection under the legislative procedure:

·         Committee stage

·         First reading stage (Parliament, Council)

·         Second reading stage

·         Conciliation and third reading stage

·         Interinstitutional negotiations – Trilogues

EU countries implementation and Commission support

Member States play a key role in ensuring EU law is implemented correctly and timely.

The Commission is responsible for making sure that all EU countries properly apply EU law. The Commission supports the process by organizing expert group meetings, stake holder consultation (example: “have your say”) and drafting guidance documents.

Commission-issued guidelines to accompany Member States through the transposition process for directives usually starting right after the adoption of an act.

This notice provides interpretative and practical guidance on the new or substantially modified provisions of the recast EPBD that Member States need to transpose.

For the transposition of the EPBD, the Commission published the following guidance documents:

1.    Minimum energy performance standards for non-residential buildings and trajectories for progressive renovation of residential buildings (Article 9)

2.    Financial incentives, skills and market barriers (Article 17) and one-stop shops (Article 18)

3.    Energy performance certificates (Articles 19-21, Annex V) and independent control systems (Annex VI)

4.    Renovation passports (Article 12, Annex VIII)

5.    Databases for the energy performance of buildings (Article 22)

6.    Data exchange (Article 16)

7.    Zero-emission buildings (Articles 7 and 11)

8.    Solar energy in buildings (Article 10)

9.    Infrastructure for sustainable mobility (Article 14)

10. Technical building systems, indoor environmental quality and inspections (Articles 13, 23 and 24)

11. Fossil fuel boilers (Article 13, Annex II)

12.  Common general framework for the calculation of the energy performance of buildings (Annex I)

13. Life-cycle global warming potential of new buildings (Article 7(2) and (5))

The comparison with national laws

The guidance documents cannot address the existing national specifications. The details of the transposition must be handled at national level.

For example, in France a new draft law deals with the transposition of the EPBD into French law. The draft law has been presented to the Council of Ministers, which paves the way for its parliamentary examination. The purpose of this bill is to transpose the EPBD before 29 May 2026.

The draft law on transposition includes the following provisions:

·         it adds the definition of “major renovation” to the French Construction and Housing Code. “Major renovation is defined as a “renovation in which the cost of the building envelope or technical systems represents at least a quarter of the value of the building, excluding the cost of the land on which it is located”.

·         it deals with the requirements for the deployment of solar panels on roofs car parks and bicycle parking spaces.

o   The French laws provide an obligation to install solar panels or a greening device on these roofs.

o   As the EPBD is focused on an energy approach, it does not consider the greening of roofs as it is the case in the French law. Therefore Article 10 of the EPBD Directive requires the installation of solar panels on buildings on a different scope from that of the French current national regulations, both for the thresholds of the surface areas of the buildings and for the building typologies.

The French REHVA member association AICVF analysed the new draft law and concluded that the proposal excludes large parts of the buildings. An alternative was proposed.

The “grey zones”

The EPBD is a binding legislative act, setting the results to be achieved, for example the CO2 neutrality in 2050, but it leaves to the national authorities to define the details and methods how to reach these goals. Therefore, the EPBD contains “grey zone” to be determined at national level.

Hereafter the example of the hydronic balancing check is described.

In EPBD article 13 (1) technical building systems, it is stated that “Member States shall, …set system requirements, …where “appropriate” for hydronic balancing of technical systems.
System requirements ...shall be applied in so far as technically, economically and functionally feasible”.

The EPBD indicates what Member States have to do.

The “grey zones” are: how to express the requirements, how “appropriate” is defined.

In the Commission Notice Annex 10 providing guidance on provisions of the recast EPBD dealing with Technical building systems, indoor environmental quality and inspections (Articles 13, 23 and 24), Chapter 2.3 is dedicated to hydronic balancing.

Information is provided on static and dynamic balancing. European (EN) and ISO standards (ISO) are referenced defining levels and types of requirements (e.g. EN ISO 52120 table 5, M3-6 and M4).

It is specified that “appropriate” design for hydronic balancing will “generally” require correct calculation of heat loss, correct dimensioning of emitters, adequate sizing of valves, correct system build-up, correct flows, temperatures, pressure losses and distribution, a sufficient possibility for measurement and control of flow and pressure in the system.

But with the term of “generally” a new grey zone is introduced.

REHVA established a task group to provide proposals for a common, technical neutral and science-based transposition.

EU Parliament Plenary session in Strasbourg.