Synthesis report on renewable energies and energy efficiency of housing

The aim of this report is to synthesise the findings of the national studies on the support provided by the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) and Cohesion Fund for the development of renewable energy and the energy efficiency of housing in the present programming period, 2007-2013. These studies were carried out by national experts in each of the 27 Member States in Spring of this year and are published on the DG Regio website. The report also draws from a review of the recent literature on energy policies across the EU and of the grounds for government intervention in the areas concerned, which is published on the same website. The concern, it should beemphasised is not to summarise the contents of these reports but to draw out the main points and to put them in a wider context. It examines in turn:

• the national policies towards developing renewable energy and improving the energy efficiency of housing across the EU;
• the contribution of the ERDF and the Cohesion Fund to these policies;
• the rationale for government intervention in these two areas and the extent to which this is spelled out in official documents, especially those relating to the deployment of Cohesion Policy funding;
• the case for Cohesion policy support in the two areas concerned.