Green homes drive key to tackling housing crisis and climate emergency

The housing crisis, climate emergency and a raft of other crises including the postwar reconstruction of Ukraine can be tackled simultaneously – by a pan-European green homes investment drive.

The Smarter Finance for EU consortium, which is aiming to unlock €100bn worth of green homes across Europe, announced the launch of a European centre of excellence to promote green home certification and investment across Europe at the Irish Green Building Council’s annual residential conference in Dublin today.

Speaking at the Smarter4EU Better Homes 2024 conference in Dublin, consortium spokesperson Elena Rastei said: “The world is facing a number of environmental and social crises, including climate change, biodiversity collapse, and the need to provide safe, healthy, affordable homes for all. Green homes can help to tackle all of these problems and more – and deliver warm, healthy, affordable homes for families all around Europe.

The EU-Life funded project is aiming to help standardise and align green home programmes across Europe with requirements affecting the finance world to support with the implementation of the European Green Deal.

The consortium includes partners with established green home programmes in Ireland, Romania and Spain, and new programmes in Portugal and Ukraine – all of which are being aligned with new rules for green investment, via the EU taxonomy for sustainable activities.

The day before the conference the consortium brought a delegation of mayors and municipal leaders from Ukraine and Portugal to visit a Clúid affordable housing scheme in Cabra certified to the Home Performance Index, the Irish Green Building Council’s sustainable home rating system.

“Green homes should not be seen as a luxury – even in a post-war setting,” says Smarter4EU energy poverty lead Iva Merheim-Eyre. “Green housing can be economically viable even in affordable housing sectors with a good blend of public and private investments.

World Green Building Council sustainable finance lead Julie Emmrich, emphasised the need to include green renovations of Europe’s existing housing stock: “The EU taxonomy currently doesn’t sufficiently incentivise investments in green retrofits in residential homes,” she said. “The Smarter  Finance for EU project aims to fill that gap.”

The Better Homes conference included a roundtable discussion on overcoming challenges to delivering green, healthy and affordable housing for all, including municipalities and financial agencies from Spain, Ireland, Portugal and Ukraine.

A session on “hybrid” finance solutions, which include blends of private and public funding, discussed delivering green homes for the social and affordable housing sectors across Europe. According to Merheim-Eyre, hybrid finance will have a particularly important role to play in unlocking green home investment across Europe, including Ukraine.

“Given the scale of the reconstruction challenge in Ukraine, hybrid finance will be required, at a time when investors are under increasing pressure to green their investment portfolios.”