Supply-side collaboration for energy-efficient renovations

Abstract

The supply side for nearly zero energy building (nZEB) renovation of owner-occupied single-family houses in Europe is suffering from a severe image problem of lack of knowledge and trust, inefficient construction processes, insufficient quality assurance and communication difficulties with home-owners. Research was done in Austria, Belgium, Germany, the Netherlands and Norway as part of an Intelligent Energy Europe project, entitled “COHERENO - Collaboration for housing nearly zero-energy renovation” to understand the emergence of collaboration structures for nearly zero energy building (nZEB) renovation of owner-occupied single-family houses. The business model of Osterwalder and Pigneur (2010) is used as a reference of the project. Used research methodologies include desk research, explorative semi-structured interviews and focus groups. Based on this, barriers and opportunities for collaboration and business model development in this market segment were detected. Important barriers on the supply side are a lack of knowledge, particularly understanding the necessity for and approaches of collaboration, and to address customer values. Also, there is a lack of capacity to absorb knowledge in small enterprises. On the demand side, there is a lack of confidence in professionals’ experience. Home-owners expect independent advice and tailored pricing. Some of the home-owners expect one actor to take the lead and be the ‘reassuring’ contact point. The way how to collaborate was addressed in the second part of the COHERENO project by organising Business Collaboration Events and action research on business modelling of cooperation structures in the different countries.