As much new living space as possible on the one hand, maximum climate protection on the other – does that go together? Building Minister Geywitz is now questioning the high standards of energy efficiency.
What is an eco-friendly home? Experts and politicians have been quick to answer this question for years: A house is environmentally friendly if it uses as little energy as possible during operation. For example, because the walls and windows are well insulated, which means that hardly any heat is lost to the outside.
The Federal Government has also been pursuing this path so far: it is promoting new buildings that are particularly well insulated and therefore energy-efficient.
But the Federal Minister for Building now has doubts about this strategy. It was not taken into account that CO2 is consumed in the manufacture of the insulating materials, Klara Geywitz said at the end of February SWR.
Geywitz questions the government’s funding policy
Insulation materials are often made of styrofoam. A substance that is derived from petroleum, so it is anything but environmentally friendly. Discussions with manufacturers to consider less climate-damaging materials have apparently not been successful so far. The minister said in mid-May at the Real Estate Industry Day in Berlin: “There are many associations with which I work extremely well. The Association of the Insulation Industry is clearly not one of them.”
In the case of insulating materials, there is also the high price in addition to the environmental aspect. Geywitz fears that if the federal government makes insulation regulations that are too strict, investors may be deterred and build less because they simply can no longer afford the expensive materials. They drive up the already high construction costs even further. Geywitz goes so far as to question the federal government’s funding policy.
From 2025 there will be new standards in new buildings
In doing so, she is running into open doors with her coalition partner, the FDP. Daniel Föst has long advocated a few strict regulations for home insulation. The construction policy spokesman for the FDP parliamentary group describes the signals from the Ministry of Construction as a paradigm shift. “Exaggerated energy efficiency levels are very expensive and don’t help the climate enough because they save too little CO2,” says Föst in an interview with the ARD capital studio.
Specifically, it is about the concepts EH40 and EH55, which according to the federal government are to become the new standards in new buildings from 2025. This means houses that consume only 40 or 55 percent of the energy of a reference house. The precise criteria are specified in the Building Energy Act. “I make a very big question mark as to whether we should afford to further raise the standards in new construction in this situation,” Geywitz clarifies. “Not from my point of view.”
Should the term “new building” be rethought?
The SPD minister wants to reassess what constitutes an environmentally friendly house today. She is concerned with the complete ecological footprint of a building – construction and operation – practically its entire life. Geywitz suggests recycling more building materials and generally relying more on natural materials, such as wood.
Daniel Föst from the FDP agrees: He sees a number of advantages in timber construction, which have proven themselves over the centuries. In his view, the term “new building” should be thought of differently in order to do something for climate protection. “New construction means upgrading the existing ones,” says Föst.
He suggests, for example, adding a timber-frame floor to existing buildings where this is technically possible. “Then I don’t have a new seal, but sustainable building materials. This is new construction that works,” the FDP politician clarifies. According to Föst, the efficiency house standards, on the other hand, cement the building of the past.
Demand for cheap KfW loans is currently high
However, the federal government initially seems to be sticking to the path it has taken. At the end of last week, it increased its subsidy program for houses with particularly good insulation by a good 400 million euros. Builders can apply for cheap loans from the state-owned KfW bank in the amount of 150,000 euros.
So the government should “keep it up” instead of reforming the criteria for the new building? Another government sponsorship of environmentally harmful insulating materials? According to the Ministry of Construction, the demand for cheap KfW loans is high at the moment – and you probably don’t want to be in the same position as at the beginning of last year, when the outrage among builders was huge after the expiry of a similar subsidy program.
In view of the many thousands of missing apartments in Germany, the traffic light coalition does not want to slow down the creation of new living space at all and that investors want to become active.