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GENERATION

Green ENERgy AudiTIng for a LOw CarboN Economy

Total budget (match funding + ERDF): 370.000 €

The GENERATION project, ‘Green ENERgy AudiTIng for a LOw CarboN Economy’, supported by the European Regional Development Fund through the POWER Programme, is a 24-month project whose main goal is the improvement and enhancement of building energy audits in four EU regions (Andalusia in Spain, South-East England in the United Kingdom, Emilia-Romagna in Italy and Malopolska in Poland). Together with an Advisory Board set up with experts coming from the four participating regions, project partners will bring together local and regional experience to deliver an innovative methodology (“Simplified Energy Audit”) that will facilitate the assessment of the energetic performance of buildings.

The project aims to contribute to the EC Climate and Energy package, which contains targets of 20-20-20% reduction of energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions, and increased share of renewables by 2020. The building sector, responsible for about 40% of the EU’s total final energy consumption and CO2 emissions, provides many cost-efficient opportunities for action, while contributing at the same time to the welfare of EU citizens. The sector has significant untapped potential for cost-effective energy savings which, if realized, would mean that in 2020 the EU will consume 11% less final energy.

GENERATION will focus on existing public buildings, in order to analyse most important barriers to a rational use of energy and to provide local and regional bodies with recommendations for the improvement of audit programmes and policies.

Participants will exchange best practice and knowledge in the field of energy audits, in order to create an innovative methodology for conducting a Simplified Energy Audit (SEA). The SEA tool will be a more cost-effective method of assessing the performance of a building, leaving comprehensive audits only for those cases where they are truly necessary. The completed tool will be tested by conducting at least 40 audits of public buildings, and a set of recommendations for the improvement of audit policies will be provided to local and regional bodies. Partners will conduct regional workshops, national & international conferences and capacity building seminars to enable interested parties to give input and benefit from project results.

GENERATION Project Documents Please click below to download the documents

GENERATION project brief

Newsletters

GENERATION 1st Newsletter

GENERATION 2nd Newsletter

GENERATION 3rd Newsletter

Best practices

During the preliminary stages of the GENERATION project, partners gathered data on energy auditing in each region. This data was analysed to assess the state of play of energy auditing in the four partner countries. From this analysis, eight best practices in energy auditing were identified, both at policy and implementation level. Each partner identified two best practices to transfer with project participant regions and beyond. Download GENERATION Best practices

Final report - Methodology fro Simplified Energy Audits

A key output for the GENERATION project is the definition of the Methodology for Simplified Energy Audits. This report provides a method for collecting and calculating the actual and theoretical consumptions of a building, and for recommending appropriate energy saving measures for implementation. In addition, the methodology allows for a simplified procedure which minimizes the resources (human and equipment) needed to carry out an energy audit.

The Methodology of the GENERATION project is based on determining the energy consumption of the building under study by means of thermal energy demand calculation. This calculation uses typical data such as walls types, windows, orientation, occupancy, and facilities; data which can be obtained easily by building managers and users. The main goal of this Methodology is to calculate and compare actual energy consumption with electricity and fuel bills in order to evaluate the status and efficiency of HVAC systems and facilities. The difference between actual and theoretical consumption allows energy auditors to evaluate the causes of a lack of energy efficiency in different areas of the building. Auditors can then propose energy saving measures in order to improve the building’s energy status, with the final aim of reducing CO₂ emissions.

Click on the report to download it!