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Climate change is recognised as one of the key challenges humankind is facing. The Information and Communication Technology (ICT) sector including data centres generates up to 2% of the global CO2 emissions, a number on par to the aviation sector contribution, and data centres are estimated to have the fastest growing carbon footprint from across the whole ICT sector, mainly due to technological advances such as the cloud computing and the rapid growth of the use of Internet services. There are no recent estimations of the total energy consumption of the European data centre and of their energy efficiency. The aim of this paper is to evaluate, analyse and present the current trends in energy consumption and efficiency in data centres in the European Union using the data submitted by companies participating in the European Code of Conduct for Data Centre Energy Efficiency programme, a voluntary initiative created in 2008 in response to the increasing energy consumption in data centres and the need to reduce the related environmental, economic and energy supply security impacts. The analysis shows that the average Power Usage Effectiveness (PUE) of the facilities participating in the programme is declining year after year. This confirms that voluntary approaches could be effective in addressing climate and energy issue.

This article analyses the status and trends of the European Union (EU) residential energy consumption in light of the energy consumption targets set by the EU 2020 and 2030 energy and climate strategies. It assesses the energy efficiency progress from 2000 to 2016, using the official Eurostat data. In 2016, the residential energy consumption amounted to 25.71% of the EU’s final energy consumption, representing the second largest consuming sector after transport. Consumption-related data are discussed together with data on some main energy efficiency policies and energy consumption determinants, such as economic and population growth, weather conditions, and household and building characteristics. Indicators are identified to show the impact of specific determinants on energy consumption and a new indicator is proposed, drawing a closer link between energy trends and policy and technological changes in the sector. The analysis of these determinants highlights the complex dynamics behind the demand of energy in the residential sector. Decomposition analysis is carried out using the Logarithmic Mean Divisia Index technique to provide a more complete picture of the impact of various determinants (population, wealth, intensity, and weather) on the latest EU-28 residential energy consumption trends. The article provides a better understanding of the EU residential energy consumption, its drivers, the impact of current policies, and recommendations on future policies.

The household sector is one of the most energy-intensive sectors in Europe, and thus a focal point for reducing greenhouse gas emissions associated with energy consumption. Energy efficiency is considered a key measure to reduce household energy consumption, but several factors could lead to an underinvestment in energy efficiency. This is the so-called energy efficiency gap or paradox. The factors in question are grouped under market failures (including informational failures), behavioural failures and other factors. Various policies can be used to address these failures and promote the adoption of energy-efficient technologies, including energy standards and codes, economic incentives and information instruments. This paper reviews the empirical evidence to date on energy efficiency policies and discusses their effectiveness. On the one hand, command and control instruments seem to be effective policies, but they have to overcome several barriers. In the case of price instruments, subsidies and taxes do not seem to be effective while rebates present mixed results as they sometimes are effective and in other cases, they could present significant shortcomings. Finally, the effectiveness of informational policies is not always ensured as they depend on the country, sector and product category. Information feedback tools also seem to be effective as they work as a constant reminder of energy-efficient behaviour. Some limitations of energy efficiency policies are also identified, such as the difficulties of implementing codes and standards given that a minimum level need to be achieved, differences in the effectiveness of rebate programmes and non-conclusive results in regard to the effectiveness of monetary energy efficiency labels.

The equipment energy efficiency improvement policy (EEEIP) is one of the important measures of energy conservation and emission reduction in various countries. However, due to the simultaneous implementation of variety policies, the effect of the single policy cannot be clearly reflected. In this paper, a method of identification and evaluation of EEEIP was proposed, and the application was verified by analyzing the example of EEEIP in Japan (Top Runner policy, TRP). Firstly, through the factor decomposition model, this paper studied the energy conservation and emission reduction potential of this policy area in Japan. Then, the TRP was identified by using moving windows and correlation analysis, and the impact of specific equipment in TRP was analyzed. Finally, through the calculation of the rebound effect of the carbon footprint (REC), this paper analyzed the energy consumption and emission reduction effects of TRP in the short-term and whole life cycle. It showed that the policy has a good effect in tertiary industry and transportation, while the effect in residential is poor. For life cycle, the TRP of air conditioning and passenger car can bring better CO2 emission reduction effect, but the emission reduction effect of lighting is basically offset.

In order to achieve long-term targets for energy savings and emission reductions, substantial savings will be needed from existing buildings. For example, a recent analysis for the USA examines aggressive strategies to cut carbon emissions in half by 2040 and finds that in order to achieve this emission reduction target, more than half of existing buildings will need comprehensive energy efficiency retrofits. Germany is targeting an overall primary energy consumption reduction of 50% in 2050 including increasing building renovation rate to 2% per year. In France, ambitious targets have also been set for existing buildings: 50% reduction of primary energy consumption in 2050 compared to the 2012 level. Multiple countries have realized the importance of comprehensive building retrofits and have begun to adopt policies to spur these improvements. For example, Germany is emphasizing grants and loans through the KfW Development Bank, complemented with building and heating system labels, a new “heating check” programme, and possible technical renovation requirements. France has established a goal of bringing all buildings up to “A” performance level (on their A–G scale) by 2050 in order for them to be sold or leased, with lower performance levels required as soon as 2020. In the USA, the focus has been on a combination of rating and disclosure of energy use, financing, and technical assistance. Focused community approaches show promise. This paper summarizes the efforts, successes and challenges, future directions, and savings of building retrofit policies in the three countries. We conclude by contrasting the three countries and discussing areas of opportunity for these and other countries.

The importance of small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) from economic, social, and environmental point of views and the crucial role of energy efficiency are widely recognized. However, the development of effective policies and their analysis are still challenging topics, for which research is relatively scarce. The main reasons for this are the high heterogeneity of SMEs, their low energy impact compared with energy-intensive enterprises, the lack of quantitative in-formation on the energy consumption of SMEs, and the low awareness of SMEs on energy topics. The structural paradigm change in the energy markets has underlined the importance of EE in SMEs. Several studies have been devoted to analyzing EE policies, using different methods and targets, not necessarily with a focus on SMEs or quantitative figures. This study presents a scoping review aimed at mapping the scientific literature on this topic, assessing its volume, nature, characteristics, type of evidence available, key concepts, and possible gaps. The existing contributions were systematized on three assessment levels regarding the EE policies for SMEs: general framework for their classification; comprehensive analysis of contributions providing qualitative information; in-depth analysis of evaluation studies including quantitative information. This study highlights the need for a good balance between economic and supportive mechanisms and the crucial role of energy audits. The analyzed contributions show that despite SMEs’ efforts to develop EE policies, there are still important barriers to be addressed. Moreover, there is an important lack of quantitative analyses, which are necessary for the development a harmonized policy evaluation approach. Based on a synthesis of the review findings, key learnings for the better design, implementation, and evaluation of EE policies for SMEs are provided.

This paper presents the challenges of increasing the energy efficiency investments in European Union (EU) residential buildings in the context of achieving climate neutrality by 2050. The paper presents the results of the PRIMES buildings model in key energy policy applications to support cost-effective and fair policy making in buildings across Europe. The model covers, in detail, the building sector for all the EU Member States (MS), segmenting the buildings into many categories. The approach proposed includes non-market barriers in conventional microeconomic modelling, which combined with idiosyncratic preferences can capture poor energy efficiency choices and still represent rational behaviours. The model includes a detailed portrayal of policies specific to the sector, comprising economic and regulatory policies as well as institutional measures. The results of the model show that the removal of non-market barriers is of great importance in reducing energy consumption and increasing both the pace and the depth of renovation investment. However, the institutional measures alone are not enough to induce energy efficiency improvement to the scale required to achieve the climate neutrality objectives. Economic (i.e., subsidies) or regulatory measures (i.e., energy performance standards) are also required to decrease emissions and energy consumption in buildings and the paper compares different configurations thereof. The optimum policy mix obviously derives from a compromise among various aims including the cost-effectiveness of the policy budget and the distributional impacts across building and consumer types.

The EU energy efficiency directive (EED) includes provisions to stimulate increased energy efficiency in companies. Mandatory provisions were first introduced in 2012 and recast in 2023. Policy learning has been suggested as an important route to policy change. This paper analyses how and why policy learning helped revising EU legislation to enhance energy efficiency in companies, using provisions of mandatory energy audits as a case. Negative experience from member states’ governments with the original provisions were voiced shortly after the adoption of EED. A complex process going back and forth between member state and EU levels led by a learning agent facilitated collective learning and change of beliefs, first in member states then in the Council. Several cognitive biases among individuals in the European Commission led to non-learning at the individual level and blocked learning at the collective level. This further blocked policy learning in the EU when EED was amended in 2018. However, external crises and the entering office of a new Commission College in 2019 made the Commission to reconsider its beliefs. Political leadership opened a window for individual and collective learning in the Commission and policy learning in the EU when provisions were changed with the recast of EED in 2023. This suggests that individual and collective learning in the EC is key for policy change to happen. Without new beliefs in the EC, it is hard to get a topic onto the policy agenda. The paper proposes policy recommendations on how to facilitate policy learning and suggests areas for further research.

Energy efficiency is a pillar for the energy system transition and for reaching the Sustainable Development Goals. In the light of the “energy efficiency first!” principle, European member states enforce policies to spread energy saving throughout the whole energy chain involving both citizens and industries. In this context, information and training campaigns arise as valuable support tools to disseminate energy efficiency and, therefore, for reducing energy consumption. Although various studies have evaluated the impact of information campaigns targeted to citizens, there is a lack of investigations that assess the impact of campaigns dedicated to industry sectors. This study discusses the results of a survey targeted at energy-intensive Italian companies, with a sample of 300 responses. Starting from the analysis of drivers that trigger the implementation of energy efficiency measures, the paper proposes an approach to evaluate the amount of energy savings linked to the Italian information and training program targeted to industries carried out by the Italian Energy Efficiency Agency. Results show that although information campaigns are not a crucial driver for companies, they are recognized as a factor that contributes to the implementation of energy efficiency practices. Findings show that roughly 1.4% of energy savings noted by interviewed companies to the Italian Energy Efficiency Agency are a direct effect of the information and training program. This outcome has significant implications, especially for decision-makers, giving evidence of the efficacy of information campaigns on industries, which have great potential for the transition to low carbon production systems.

This study investigates the impact of energy efficiency measures installed through the Carbon Emission Reduction Target (CERT) and the Community Energy Saving Programme (CESP) on domestic gas and total energy consumptions. The recently released National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework (NEED) database is used to examine the changes in domestic gas and total energy consumptions for the dwellings in the sample relative to the changes in gas and total energy consumptions for a comparable control group in the year after installation. The results obtained from this difference-in-difference analysis confirm that observed energy consumption decreases significantly in dwellings following upgrades such as cavity wall insulation, loft insulation and a new efficient boiler. The single most effective energy efficiency measure when installed alone is found to be cavity wall insulation, reducing annual gas consumption by 10.5 % and annual total energy consumption by 8.0 % in the year following installation. Comparing bundles of different energy efficiency measures, we find that dwellings retrofitted with both cavity wall insulation and a new efficient boiler experience the largest reductions in annual gas and total energy consumptions of 13.3 and 13.5 %, respectively. This is followed by a mean annual reduction of 11.9 and 10.5 % in gas and total energy consumptions for dwellings with all three energy efficiency measures installed in the same year. Contrary to expectations, installing cavity wall insulation on its own is found to be more effective in reducing measured energy consumption than combining loft insulation and a new efficient boiler.