With the European Green Deal, the EU is increasing its climate ambition and aims at becoming the first climate-neutral continent by 2050. The Commission has therefore revised the Energy Efficiency Directive, together with other EU energy and climate rules, to ensure that the new 2030 target of reducing greenhouse gas emission by at least 55% (compared to 1990) can be met.

To meet the new EU 2030 climate target energy efficiency needs to be prioritised. To step up its efforts, the European Commission put forward, in July 2021, a proposal for a new directive on energy efficiency as part of the package “Delivering on the European Green Deal”.

The proposal for the revised directive promotes ‘energy efficiency first’ as an overall principle of EU energy policy, and mark its importance and relevance in both its practical applications in policy and investment decisions.

The 2018 amending directive

In 2018, as part of the 'Clean energy for all Europeans package', the amending Directive on Energy Efficiency (2018/2002) was agreed to update the policy framework to 2030 and beyond. Its key element is a headline energy efficiency target for 2030 of at least 32.5%. The target, to be achieved collectively across the EU, is set relative to the 2007 modelling projections for 2030.

In absolute terms, this means that EU energy consumption should be no more than 1128 Mtoe (million tonnes of equivalent) of primary energy and/or no more than 846 Mtoe of final energy (following the withdrawal of the UK).

The amending directive also includes an extension to the energy savings obligation in end use, introduced in the 2012 directive. Under the amending directive, EU countries will have to achieve new energy savings of 0.8% each year of final energy consumption for the 2021-2030 period, except Cyprus and Malta that will have to achieve 0.24% each year instead.

The directive entered into force in December 2018 and had to be transposed into national law by Member States by 25 June 2020, except for metering and billing provisions which has a different deadline (25 October 2020).

Under the Governance Regulation 2018/1999 , Member States are required to draw up integrated 10-year national energy and climate plans (NECPs) outlining how they intend to meet the energy efficiency and other targets for 2030.

Other elements in the amended directive include:

• stronger rules on metering and billing of thermal energy by giving consumers - especially those in multi-apartment building with collective heating systems – clearer rights to receive more frequent and more useful information on their energy consumption, also enabling them to better understand and control their heating bills.
• requiring EU countries to have in place transparent, publicly available national rules on the allocation of the cost of heating, cooling and hot water consumption in multi-apartment and multi-purpose buildings with collective systems for such services.
• monitoring efficiency levels in new energy generation capacities.
• updated primary energy factor (PEF) for electricity generation of 2.1 (down from the current 2.5).
• a general review of the Energy Efficiency Directive (required by 2024).

Updated measures relating to national long-term renovation strategies are now covered under the amended Energy Performance of Buildings Directive (EU)2018/844.

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