The Heat Coalition, which includes ESTIF, a platform gathering 11 European nations with a stake in the heating and cooling sector, has warned that the forthcoming European climate and energy policy framework must adequately address the future role of the sector given that it accounts for no less than 45 percent of the final energy consumption in Europe today.
The stance taken by the Green Paper “A 2030 framework for climate and energy policies”, published yesterday, nevertheless reinforces the conclusion made by the International Energy Authority (IEA) in their Energy Technology Perspectives publication in which the IEA argue that the heating and cooling sector remains a neglected area of energy policy. There is virtually no mention of the sector in the Green Paper or any reference to the challenges it faces. The IEA concludes that on this basis the paper fails to discuss relevant issues.
The Heat Coalition believes that it is the right time to develop a comprehensive European approach for heating and cooling towards affordability and competitiveness. Recently the European Parliament responded to the European Commission’s Energy Roadmap 2050 by calling on the Commission to “consider the full integration of the heating and cooling sector into the transformation of the energy system” stressing that “readily available renewable energy solutions (geothermal, biomass including biodegradable waste, solar thermal and hydro/aerothermal), in combination with energy efficiency measures, have the potential to decarbonize the heat demand by 2050 in a more cost-effective way, while addressing the problem of energy poverty.” The Heat Coalition also stated that more attention should be given to the potential of renewables within the sector, which at present remains largely untapped.
The Heat Coalition is now calling on the European Commission to put forward a comprehensive energy strategy which must include improved collection of statistics and data and must also promote innovative renewable energy sources and energy efficient solutions throughout the entire supply chain.
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