(Finance) – Il Advise and the National Accountants Foundation have published the document “First examination of the “Energy performance in buildings” Directive and better known as “Green homes directive“” created by the “Real estate taxation and ecological transition” Commission chaired by Marco Preverin and falling within the “Taxation” area to which the National Councilor Treasurer Salvatore Regalbuto is delegated.
The work, edited by Cristoforo Florio, Francesco Nesci and Stefano Spina, has the aim of providing an initial analysis of the Directive, which also allows non-experts to have a general picture of the provisions contained within it. As mentioned in the introduction, the European Union has long been trying to combat climate change. According to the European Environment Agency, in 2015 the European Union was the world’s third largest producer of greenhouse gases after China and the United States while, in 2019, it was fourth after China, the United States and India.
As regards buildings, since their heating and cooling require 40% of all energy consumed in the European Union and produce 36% of energy-related greenhouse gas emissions, the TA-directive proposal has been prepared 9-2023-0068 called “Energy performance in buildings” with the aim of reducing, through the improvement of the energy performance of buildings, greenhouse gas emissions to achieve, by 2050, a zero-emission real estate park. In December 2023, the European Parliament and the European Council prepared a new text (TA-9-2024_0129) which, compared to the previous draft, recognizes greater flexibility for individual EU states while maintaining the final objective of climate neutrality by 2050, with a first significant step set for 2030.
This document was definitively approved (Directive 2024/1275) on 12 March 2024 by the European Parliament and on 12 April 2024 by ECOFIN (Economic and Financial Council of the European Union) and was published in the Official Journal of the European Union on 8 May 2024, entering into force from 29 May 2024. A starting from this last date, all EU member countries have two years to implement the Directive and present the renovation plans for their national building stock.
The importance that the Directive assumes for the efficiency of the building stock is evident, as is the role that accountants, as business and sustainability consultants, will be able to play in achieving the challenging objectives identified by the Directive itself.
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