background
Homeowners quickly reach their financial limits when it comes to energy-saving renovations – especially as building becomes more and more expensive. Adjusted for prices, investments in energy efficiency have actually fallen since 2011.
Stefan Immesberger moved from Stuttgart back to his parents’ house in Saarland a year ago. He has just started a family of his own. With a small child, the apartment in Stuttgart became too small, so he and his wife took over the house in Quierschied in Saarland. It was built in the 1980s and is well maintained, but there was still room for improvement in terms of energy efficiency.
After an energy consultation at the consumer advice center, he had the windows replaced for 20,000 euros. But that was when the external insulation came to an end. It would have cost 40,000 euros. If the outer wall was thicker, the roof overhang would have been too short. Therefore, the roof would have had to be adjusted for an additional 40,000 euros. An investment that would only have been worthwhile for Immesberger after 40 to 50 years – even with high energy costs. “From my point of view, that doesn’t make sense,” he says. “It just wasn’t economically feasible.”
Homeowner Immesberger: Renovation was “simply not economically feasible”
Buildings important for climate goals
Many homeowners apparently feel the same way. Rising energy costs and the discussion about more climate-friendly living have not persuaded Germans to invest more in the energy efficiency of their homes – on the contrary.
The German Institute for Economic Research (DIW), together with the construction service provider Heinze, has examined investments in energy-efficient renovations since 2011. The result: Annual spending on this increased in absolute amounts by almost 40 percent to 67 billion euros between 2011 and 2022. But if you factor out the effect of increased prices during this period, you can see that investments in energy-saving renovations last year were 13 percent below the 2011 level in real terms.
The building sector is particularly important if the federal government wants to achieve its climate goals. According to the Expert Council for Climate Issues, significantly more greenhouse gases must be saved by 2030. The DIW study authors still see a lot of open potential here that could be exploited through more energy-efficient renovations.
“Other things take priority”
Architect Anja Diehl is not surprised that homeowners are making compromises when it comes to energy-saving renovations. “I have a lot of projects that were planned two years ago. But they were not implemented due to high demand. And now they cost twice as much.”
High prices and interest rates combined with falling subsidies – an extremely unfavorable situation for the deputy chairwoman of the Building Energy Consultants Saarland eV. The number of orders for external insulation from the Saarland painting guild is also falling. You can feel that people currently have to hold on to their money.
Energy consultant Anja Diehl confirms this impression. “People already know that windows that are 20 years old may still look good, but in terms of energy efficiency they should actually be removed. But these are huge investments. And then other things take priority.”
Heating disputes have put many people off
It’s not just the costs that deter homeowners. The political discussion about the Building Energy Act, often called the Heating Act, also unsettled and discouraged many. “It is often said that we want to wait until we have legal certainty about what we actually have to do,” says Diehl.
Roman Salm from the Saarland Heating, Sanitary and Air Conditioning Guild has also noticed a slump due to the discussion about the Building Energy Act. After the outbreak of the war in Ukraine, there was a wave of requests for new heaters. “Thanks to the legal ban and the summer break, the whole thing returned to normal and we can work normally again.”
“There needs to be calm again”
Energy consultant Diehl warns against rushing into energy renovations. Climate change is becoming noticeable and a lot still has to happen to achieve the climate goals. That also brings in a hectic pace. “Then people rush ahead, including on the part of the trades. I often experience that the suggestion of a careful analysis and advice doesn’t get very far, because then there is already an offer from the plasterer or the heating engineer.”
Many advisory services are therefore not effective. Homeowners often no longer have an overview of what they should invest in. “You have to collect it sorted and it’s important to restore calm,” says Anja Diehl. It is important to have energy advice that looks at the house as a whole. Replacing the heating or energy source immediately is always wrong.
More capacity due to a slump in new construction?
According to the DIW study, energy-efficient renovations have performed significantly worse in recent years than new buildings, for example. “There has simply been a lack of capacity in the construction industry in recent years,” says study co-author Katrin Klarhöfer from Heinze GmbH. “And the new building was undoubtedly more lucrative for the companies.”
Significantly less new construction is now taking place, so there is more capacity for energy-saving renovations. There could also be an opportunity there. But in order to achieve the goals for reducing greenhouse gases, many times more would have to be renovated within a short period of time – according to the study authors. The challenge remains enormous.