The materials for energy-efficient building refurbishment can also be harmful to the environment.
(Photo: dpa)
Brussels The EU Commission wants to reduce the environmentally harmful effects of construction. It wants to promote the recycling of building materials and issue new regulations on the sustainability of products. This emerges from a draft of the Construction Products Regulation, which is available to the Handelsblatt and which is to be presented this Wednesday.
The EU has set itself the task of drastically reducing the CO2 emissions from buildings. This requires new buildings and renovations on a large scale. But that also harms the environment. The Commission estimates that construction, renovation and the manufacture of building materials together account for five to twelve percent of greenhouse gas emissions in the EU. It also accounts for 35 percent of all waste.
CO2 emissions from cement production are unavoidable. Insulating materials are often difficult to recycle.
The Construction Products Ordinance should now stipulate, for example, that recycled or biodegradable products must be given preference and that the shelf life of products is not unnecessarily shortened.
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At the same time, trade should be made easier. The more products are standardized across Europe, the easier it is for construction companies to find inexpensive products. This can reduce costs and thus help the industry.
Craft pleads for standardization
“The backlog of harmonized standards in the construction products sector must be eliminated,” confirms Karl-Sebastian Schulte, Managing Director of the Central Association of German Crafts.
The EU Commission wants to commission such standards from the standardization organizations and then declare them to be generally binding.
The construction industry is also in favor of closing legal loopholes. But she also fears over-regulation: “There is a risk that the Commission will get bogged down by wanting to regulate all sustainability requirements for building products with the same legal act that regulates the safe use of building products,” says Tim-Oliver Müller, Managing Director of the Main Association of the German Construction Industry.
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The planned regulation does not go far enough for the Greens. “In order to recover raw materials from waste, as many product groups as possible must meet mandatory sustainability standards,” says MEP Anna Cavazzini. “Regardless of whether it’s for mobile phones, T-shirts or the garage door – with a digital product pass for as many products as possible on the internal market, the information must be made accessible to companies and consumers using a QR code.” intended.
The regulation is part of a package from the EU Commission on the circular economy. This also includes a revision of the Ecodesign Directive. A draft of this is also available to the Handelsblatt.
So far, electrical appliances such as washing machines or refrigerators have been rated on the basis of this regulation. It should now be possible to include other products, such as textiles or building materials, which consume energy during their production or can cause other environmental damage. They too can then carry a label that classifies their sustainability on the well-known scale from A to G.
More: Real estate manager criticizes the calculation: New construction is significantly more energy-intensive than renovation