Energy Trap
Investigating the renovations failure
More and more European households are struggling with increasing energy bills. While war in Ukraine is the main trigger of such high energy costs, the underlying structural problem making Europe so vulnerable to energy prices is home grown: The European building stock is old and energy inefficient.
Renovating buildings could – theoretically – solve all these problems at once: Less people would live in damp or cold homes, the energy costs for heating would decrease, as would the climate impact of the building sector. At the same time, this would decrease the geopolitical vulnerability of Europe, as the war in Ukraine proved our dependency on energy from autocratic regimes. So far the theory.
In reality, especially the energy for tenants and poorer home owners are increasing drastically – and add up on top of the increasing rents. Renovations simply do not pay off enough for landlords. And if they are done, the costs are often paid by tenants having to pay for the renovations with much higher rents or else being subject to evictions.
Over the past six months, we have been working with media outlets in Germany, the Czech Republic, Italy, Belgium, Austria, Poland, France and Sweden to find out why renovations are not happening, and what the costs to tenants and the climate are.
