To be successful, energy renovation construction programs in northern China require both proper understanding of the causes of quality failures and effective strategies for renovating existing residential buildings for energy savings. However, surprisingly, although in recent years more attention has been focused on studying quality failures and reducing their causes, such failures still frequently occur in building energy renovation projects. In practice, the causes are not isolated, but rather, stem from complex correlations that impede high-quality performance. Due to their neglect of the causal relationships among these factors in quality failures, project coordinators have been unsuccessful in managing the quality of construction projects. Considering a network of different causes, this work reports on efforts to identify and manage the causes of quality failures in construction processes. A new understanding of the nature of these causes was achieved by considering four sources of data: literature review, opinions of experts, interpretive structural modeling (ISM), and focus groups. Our analysis shows that not only do many causes directly influence construction quality in building energy renovation projects, but also these causes interact with each other. It is noteworthy that external causes remain associated with all internal causes. Drivers of these causes are lack of experienced project managers, unauthorized changes in design documents, incomplete building information in projects, and poor onsite coordination; eliminating them enables solutions to a number of other internal causes. Finally, solutions are proposed to improve the current situation. These solutions fall into the categories of people, materials and equipment, design, and organization, based on the quality management process. The findings of this work provide valuable information for helping both policy makers and practitioners adopt effective policies and measures to manage the construction quality of building energy renovation projects. @en

The implementation of energy retrofit of residential buildings faces many risks around the world, especially in China, leading to low retrofit progress. Stakeholders’ proactive risk management is the key to the smooth implementation of retrofit projects but is normally affected by risk perception. Perceived risks instead of real risks are the motivators of their proactive behaviours. This paper aims to understand and address the present risk perception of stakeholders in order to drive effective proactive risk mitigation practices. Based on a risk list identified through a literature review and interviews, a questionnaire survey was then made to analyse and compare different stakeholders’ perceptions of each risk by measuring the levels of their concern about risks. It is validated that all the stakeholder groups tend to mitigate risks perceived highly proactively. Proactive risk management of risk-source-related stakeholders deserves more attention and responsibility-sharing with transaction costs (TCs) considerations contribute to the enhancement of risk perception. More responsibilities of construction quality and maintenance is taken by the government and contractors should be clarified, and the government should also be responsible for assisting design work. Effective information is beneficial to the decrease in homeowners’ risk perception that can motivate their initiative of cooperation.@en

The renovation of housing stock in the Netherlands has the potential to help achieving the country's climate change targets. However, there are non-monetary Transaction Cost (TC) factors, such as searching for information and finding a reliable professional/contractor, that present barriers to householders when making the decision to renovate or not. This study evaluates the impact of the transaction costs on the renovation decision-making process for two groups of householders, current renovators and potential renovators, and for three types of renovations, exterior renovations, interior renovations, and energy efficiency renovations. The study analyses householder renovation decisions in relation to TC barriers at different stages of the renovation processes. The data was collected from a survey of 3,776 homeowners in the Netherlands. The main identified TC barriers were found to be at the consideration, decision, and execution phases of the renovation decision-making process, and are: finding a reliable professional/contractor to do exterior renovations, determining costs for interior renovations, and finding ways to increase the energy efficiency of the house using energy-saving renovations. The main sources of information for householders are construction stores/Do It Yourself (DIY), installations and maintenance companies for exterior and energy efficiency renovations, while for interior renovations it is construction stores/DIY companies, Internet, and recommendations from family/friends. The findings from this study contribute to more effective management and distribution of both information and financial resources in relation to the renovation of housing stock.@en

Building energy renovations can effectively improve the environmental performance and energy sustainability of existing buildings. From 2007 onwards, the Chinese government has promoted energy-saving renovations of existing urban residential buildings. Nevertheless, various quality failures happen during the construction period in energy-saving renovation projects of residential buildings. Yet, the causes and their characters remain largely unknown. Through a literature review, this paper investigates the causes of quality failures. Validated through experts’ interviews, a total of 18 causes were identified in building energy renovation projects. These causes were analyzed from two main aspects: the importance of a cause (related to impact and frequency), and the level of effort required to address a cause (related to origin and scale), using both a questionnaire survey and a focus group. The results indicate that the critical causes of quality failures are working under high-cost and high-time pressure, adverse natural conditions, fraud of construction companies, incomplete construction site survey, poor checking procedures of supervisors, poor operational skilled workers, inadequate equipment performance, lack of experienced project managers, and incomplete building information in projects. The causes were classified as external and internal causes of building energy renovation projects. The outcome of this paper should aid policy makers and project coordinators to focus on critical causes of quality failures, and to develop effective actions and policy interventions to achieve successful renovation projects with high-quality performance@en

The housing stock has a considerable share of 40% in energy consumption and 36% of CO 2 emissions in the EU. In accordance to energy efficiency and emissions targets set by EU, The Netherlands has aimed to renovate 300,000 homes each year, leading to 50% reduction in CO 2 emissions, by 2050. Many factors including low renovation rates create uncertainties in achieving these targets. The current study aims for understanding the barriers and drivers towards energy efficiency renovations (EERs) amongst Dutch homeowners, and to aid in gaining a better insight into the role of public authorities in promoting EERs. First, the extrinsic drivers, including policies and other initiatives in the EER process are explained. Second, the intrinsic drivers and intrinsic/extrinsic barriers are explored. Regression analyses are performed on the national Dutch survey data for renovators and potential renovators. Our main findings include: (a) desire to enhance the quality of their life, rather than the financial benefits, etc. is identified as the main driver; (b) the main barriers are the costs of EERs, complexities in the process, information barriers, and finding reliable experts and information; (c) For improvement in meeting renovation targets, the current Dutch policies need to consider all the decision criteria by homeowners, such as: Reducing the complexities; Time needed to obtain loans and subsidies; and Facilitating access to information. @en

Purpose: This paper aims to evaluate the quality control systems for constructions in seven countries in Europe with the purpose to trace innovative approaches and best practices that can serve as examples for other countries. Design/methodology/approach: The paper is based on a series of research projects carried out over a number of years. The research results were updated in 2016 with a desktop research project in seven European countries. The results from this latest project form the heart of this paper. The information is organised into tables that describe and analyse the main features of the quality control systems of the countries (e.g. scope, focus and main characteristics of the procedures and quality demands on building professionals). Findings: Several similar trends can be recognised in the quality control systems of the various European Union (EU) countries. Quality control is getting more and more privatised and the control framework is setting checks and balances throughout the construction process. Other findings are that scope and focus of the statutory control is unbalanced. Within the control processes emphasis is put on the safety aspects of complex constructions. Far fewer demands are made on the quality of the builders. Re-orientation of the building regulatory framework seems to be needed. Research limitations/implications: The paper only focusses on European countries where private quality control is established and on selected topics. The findings are based on desktop research and not on the practical experiences of the stakeholders involved in the countries studied. Practical implications: The paper draws some important recommendations for policymakers in the building regulatory field. It suggests both an enhancement of the effectiveness of the quality control procedure as well as the commitment of builders to comply with the regulations. Social implications: The quality of constructions is essential for the wellbeing and safety of its users, its occupants or its visitors. This applies to the whole range of quality aspects: structural- and fire safety, health, sustainability and usability aspects. The analyses and recommendations of this paper aim to contribute to an improvement of the overall construction quality. Originality/value: The paper makes an original contribution to the (limited) literature that is available in this field. The results can be used to situate the quality control systems of each member state within the EU, to assess the main trends, and it can be used as a guide to develop strategic choices on possible improvements in each country.@en

This report answers the question: How can HEMS be used to influence energy-saving behaviour of homeowners? Lessons regarding the feedback from HEMS to influence energy-saving behaviour have been explored and specifications of HEMS to influence energy saving by households are given. Generally, the implementation of the Triple-A HEMS should appeal to (1) end-users (households) and (2) local authorities. Triple-A partners will provide HEMS to households to encourage them to change their energy behaviour and to trigger interest in the adoption of low carbon technologies. Another goal is to apply HEMS in demonstration exemplars (WP 4) to monitor the energy consumption of households and analyse consumption data before and after applying low carbon technologies. HEMS with real time feedback have a good potential to influence the energy use and subsequent savings of households. In order to realise a structural change of the energy use behaviour it also must become customary for households to use the feedback system. The need of forming an energy saving habit also sets demands on the functionality and design of the feedback system. It must meet the preferences, capabilities and interest of a heterogonous group of homeowners or should be designed for specific customer segments. Direct feedback instruments primarily influence low-cost-quick-win measures: simple changes in behaviour that require little or no effort or investments. These behavioural changes however can potentially lead to substantial immediate savings. The rollout of smart meters and HEMS differs strongly between the EU countries and the Triple-A countries. Energy providers can play an important role in the rollout of HEMS. The use of smart meters and HEMS and providing easy access of HEMS to homeowners could be one of the instruments of local energy saving programs and community-based reinforcement strategies of local authorities. A neighbourhood approach aims to enable more positive outcomes for energy savings and uptake of renovation measures, by using peer-to-peer communication, personal advice, trialling in demo houses and demonstration in pop-up centres and on local authority websites. To monitor actual CO2 savings by local authorities within the demonstration areas, baseline requirements for HEMS deal with recording (or accessing data related to) annual energy use gas and/or electricity within the properties for a period of 12 months before and after installation. Next to baseline requirements local authorities can choose discretionary functions and requirements of HEMS, including e.g. measuring grid energy monitoring and comfort performance. HEMS will also be used to give real-time feedback of the energy use to homeowners helping them to manage their energy consumption. For this purpose recommendations are: • HEMS should be easy to use and accessible, and fit for purpose. • Feedback should be real-time, frequent feedback enables the user to link behaviour to consequences. • The specifications of the HEMS should match with the household characteristics and the willingness to use HEMS. A distinction between user groups is advisable: some users explicitly have more interest in more functionalities (and thus a more complex HEMS, others want a more intuitive user interface. • Whether adoption of HEMS leads to the adoption of renovation measures is not (yet) known. • HEMS should appeal to certain conditions of the homeowner (segments) or to solving issues within the home. Overall recommendations for choosing HEMS include: • The HEMS should be cost-effective. • The installation of the HEMS should be easy (preferentially without electricity connection). • The intrusion time for installing in the home should be minimized. • A preference is given for HEMS that local authorities can experiment with free-of-charge to avoid de minimis statements. • HEMS choice by local authorities will be influenced by the need to follow up KPI’s for energy saving, and thus by the compatibility with their own energy management system for analysing building stocks.@en

Dutch policies to reach a CO2 neutral housing stock in 2050 force housing associations to realise higher renovation rates at lower costs. The potential for standardisation in renovation processes of the housing stock is huge. Practice shows that an increasing number of housing associations bundle their individual maintenance and sustainable renovation projects in renovation programs for two or more years. Programs that are then implemented in strategic partnerships with maintenance contractors. This paper clarifies the rationale behind this development, sketches internal and external factors that encourage and hinder this development and presents the effects of the shift from projects to programs. The paper contributes to the scientific body of knowledge of public clients in construction collaborating with market parties. The research provides housing associations and contractors tools for the implementation of successful partnerships. The paper is based on an explorative literature review and case-studies of strategic partnerships in this field. The findings show that strategic partnering in housing renovation programs increases the renovation rates of individual housing associations. Also the tenants' satisfaction with the renovation process is high. Trust is key in the collaboration between the strategic partners. Hindering factors are the realisation of the necessary culture and organizational changes on both the supply and demand side. @en

Local authorities engaged in the Interreg 2 Seas project Triple-A want to achieve a market acceleration in the owner-occupied single-family home renovation sector by increasing awareness of - and enabling access to – energy saving technologies. Various local authorities are particularly looking for opportunities to improve their communication channels using novel web functions. This report looks into opportunities for stimulating homeowners to adopt energy-saving technologies by improving municipal communication channels, particularly web portals. First, literature research reflects on the influence of communication channels on homeowner renovation decision-making processes. The research further provides an inventory of strengths and weaknesses of existing web portals aimed at awareness raising among homeowners and reflects on new web platform developments. Secondly, data on current web portals of local authorities were collected from local authorities in four countries (Belgium, France, The Netherlands, UK). The qualitative analysis compares existing local authorities’ web portals against key characteristics for providing homeowner support, to identify potential for improvement. Thirdly, local scoping workshops were organized in seven local authorities to determine most effective modules to improve local authority web portals. A demo workshop resulted in a list of desired web functions for local authorities. Local discussion with stakeholders revealed the main opportunities and barriers for improving existing local authority web portals and a selection of at least five web functions for immediate development. The research resulted in a long-term perspective on web portal development and a set of modules and recommendations for strengthening local authorities’ web portals for increasing awareness and easy access to low carbon technologies. Based on this, seven local authorities identified the most effective modules to improve their web portals in the short term in co-creation with stakeholders.@en

Onderzoek uitgevoerd in opdracht van Ministerie van Binnenlandse Zaken en Koninkrijksrelaties DG Wonen en Bouwen.@en

Local authorities engaged in the Interreg 2 Seas project Triple-A aim to achieve a market acceleration in the owner-occupied single-family home renovation sector by increasing awareness of – and enabling access to – energy saving technologies. Various local authorities are considering using consultation centres and pop-up models (or pop-up centres) as additional opportunities to reach their goals and to improve their communication with homeowners. This report analyses the experiences and opportunities that various models of consultancy centres and pop-up models can offer to stimulate homeowners to adopt energy-saving technologies. In the first place experiences of already existing consultancy centres and pop-ups in the four countries of the Triple-A partners were analysed (Belgium, France, The Netherlands, UK). The customer journey model (e.g. the process starting with creating awareness, providing information up to the execution of energy saving measures) was used as the framework to reflect on the needed activities in centres and related pop-ups. The various examples are described in a short, concise format and were chosen because they illustrate the wide range of possible pop-up concepts. Secondly the specific needs and wishes of the Triple-A partners were assessed. Via a questionnaire the partners were asked how they intended to use consultation centres and pop-ups (e.g. what kind of information do they want to provide in what way, to what target group?) and what kind of model they had in mind (e.g. a more permanent centre or a temporary pop-up?). Workshops were organised (held in Antwerp on the 13th October 2017) with the LA’s to determine and specify their wishes on business model development not only to determine possible pop-up model concepts but also to address public-private cooperation in this field. As a further illustration and as sources of possible inspiration the business models of a few selected existing consultation centres were reviewed in depth (Woon+bus, Kyotomobiel and EcoHuis in Belgium and Reimarkt and ICDuBo in the Netherlands). These few selected case were chosen because they fitted in within the Triple-A business models that have been formulated at the beginning of the project.@en

Traditionally quality control of construction work in Europe was a governmental responsibility. In most European countries local authority building control were responsible for the issuing of planning or building permits and carried out plan approval, site-inspections and checks on completion of constructions. During the last decades however these building control tasks have been outsourced more and more to private parties. The main driving force behind this development has been the wish of governments to deregulate. The shift of responsibilities to the private/market parties should not only improve the quality of construction works but it could also streamline administrative procedures and processes. In the eyes of the policymakers this leads to a win-win situation: less regulation, leading to a qualitative better building stock through optimised (cheaper & faster) quality control procedures. It is exactly because of these reasons that the Dutch government is on the brink changing its quality control system of constructions towards a more private model. An international comparison in England & Wales, Ireland, Germany, France, Norway and Sweden puts the Dutch policy plans in a European perspective.@en

The process of residential energy retrofitting needs to be advanced, especially in the hot summer and cold winter (HSCW) zone of China. Good cooperation from homeowners is the key to the smooth project implementation. Some studies have identified four categories of information as important factors affecting homeowners' decision-making in retrofitting. Such information can improve homeowners' cooperation to some extent. This paper investigates the nature of this influence mechanism of retrofitting information, so as to stimulate homeowners' cooperation. The authors, first, explain how the direct relationship between information and homeowners' level of cooperation is validated. Second, under the mediation role of risk perception, we verify the indirect influence of such information. Third, we analyse the variation in the strength of the relationships between information and homeowners' cooperation under the influence of source credibility. It is concluded that providing information on retrofitting benefits and service is more effective for improving homeowners’ cooperation. The integrity of building quality information and the understandability, to the homeowners, of technology information need to be considered. Priority should be given to the sources of expert knowledge and published resources, because they are perceived by homeowners to be relatively credible. Policy suggestions are proposed based on the results.@en

Energy retrofit of residential buildings is an approach to reduce worldwide energy consumption. Residential energy retrofitting in China mostly focuses on multi-owner residential buildings with composite ownership that dozens of private homeowners own their apartment and jointly own the common parts of a building. The implementation of residential energy retrofit faces many risks, causing the slow retrofit process in the hot summer and cold winter (HSCW) zone of China. Transaction cost theory (TCT) is conducive to enrich an in-depth understanding of risk inventories in the energy retrofitting context. This paper aims to explore the key risks in retrofit projects of residential buildings in the HSCW zone with transaction costs (TCs) considerations, in order to provide the direction for effective risk management. First, based on the theoretical risks with TCs considerations, interviews were conducted to adjust the risk list and to connect these risks with stakeholders and stages. Second, a questionnaire survey was made based on two parameters of risk probability and severity, and then ten top risks were chosen as key risks through both a risk matrix and Borda count. The results show that most of the key risks are associated with homeowners and contractors, involving retrofit awareness, cooperation performance, opportunism, professional expertise, construction management, safety management, and maintenance, of which most occur at the stage of on-site construction. Information cost is the largest source of TCs relevant to these key risks and is mainly borne by the government and homeowners. TCs can also provide a lens for the retrofitting in other countries to understand risks, and the decrease in information costs contributes to effective risk management both in China and in the international context.@en

The housing sector is responsible for a more than a quarter of the total final energy consumption in the EU. As the majority (70%) of the EU-housing stock is owner occupied and largely consists of single family dwellings it is understandable that many countries focus their energy saving policies on homeowners. Complementary to the national policy frameworks, regional and local authorities implement locally based policy instruments targeting specific groups and individual homeowners. In order to enlarge the effectiveness of their policy instruments and to reach the energy saving goals, frontrunner local authorities in particular are searching for ways to reach homeowners. Consultancy centres and pop-ups can be a way to make individual homeowners more aware about their energy use and stimulate them to apply low carbon technologies. The research results not only show that a wide range of business models are available to develop, structure and organise these consultation centres and pop-ups, but also that they indeed could play an important role in accelerating the energy performance of owner occupied housing. Through a pop-up or consultancy centre, public and private parties can join their forces to reach, stimulate and support the individual needs and wishes of homeowners during their customer journey to realise an energy efficient dwelling@en

The goals of energy saving and CO2 reductions to create an energy neutral building stock seem only to be reached by strict and supportive governmental policies. In Europe the Energy Performance of Buildings Directive and the Energy Efficiency Directive are driving forces for Member States to develop and strengthen energy performance regulations both for new buildings (via building approval procedures) and the existing building stock (via energy performance certificates or labels). The effectiveness of these current governance instruments and their impact on actual CO2 reductions are found to be inadequate for ensuring actual energy performance is achieved. To realize the very ambitious energy saving goals a radical rethink of regulatory systems and instruments is necessary. Building performance and the behaviour of the occupants is not well understood by the policymakers. Alternative forms of governance are needed which have more impact on the actual outcomes. Supportive governance to stimulate near zero renovations in combination with performance guarantees is a promising approach. Furthermore engagement with occupant practices and behaviours is needed. To ensure accurate outcomesbased governance a better understanding of building performance and behaviours of occupants must be incorporated.@en

Building energy renovations contribute significantly to energy sustainability and environmental protection. These advantages have increased the importance of renovating existing residential buildings in many countries. In China, the government has supported the energy-saving renovation of existing urban residential buildings since 2007. However, quality failures, which do not meet the technical requirements, occur during construction processes in building energy renovation projects. Although quality failures are regarded as a crucial problem in building energy renovation projects, the identification of quality failures and their sources, likelihood, impacts, and causes remain mostly unknown. This paper investigates the nature of quality failures in building energy renovation projects. A total of 25 quality failures were first identified through five cases, and interviews with six experienced construction professionals in China. A questionnaire survey was further conducted to evaluate the frequency of quality failures. The results show the nature of quality failures that arise during construction and their sources, occurrence frequency, causes, and impacts. The research reveals that quality failures are caused by defaults by workers; inadequate checking procedures; incomplete construction site surveys; inaccurate design work; fraud of construction companies; and inefficient cooperation between different departments. Above all, the behaviors of the main actors are responsible for poor construction quality. Additionally, emphasis on quality control during the renovation preparation stage is critical to ensure that quality failures are reduced in numbers and severity.@en