Estonian Grant Scheme for Renovating Apartment Buildings

Abstract

In Estonia there is a total of approximately 27,000 apartment buildings, and approximately 90% of all apartment buildings were built before 1990. The majority of those buildings have same typical problems: high energy consumption levels, insufficient ventilation, uneven indoor temperatures, and insufficient thermal comfort levels. Therefore, a pretty extensive, or ‘deep’ level of renovation is required. Any large-scale and systematic renovation process for apartment buildings in Estonia is complicated due to the fact that a total of 82% of dwellings are privately owned. Apartment buildings are generally managed by apartment associations which means that all of the apartment owners in each building must agree on the volume of any renovation work and also on the budget for such work.During the period between 2010-2014, a total of 663 apartment buildings have undergone renovation work in Estonia thanks to a support scheme that is joint-financed by Assigned Amount Unit trading and a government budget, administered by Fund KredEx. The total of investment in relation to apartment associations and the grant scheme amounted to 151 million euros, of which 38 million took the form of grants. Average energy savings per apartment building were 43% and the total annual energy saving was approximately 60GWh. The main lessons learned have been that preparation with an apartment association in regard to renovation work takes time - up to two years - and there is no direct way in which apartment associations can be guided when it comes to renovation work; this can only be managed through raising awareness and though good example.A total of 102 million euros of European Union Structural Funds will be used in a new grant scheme which started in 2015, to renovate existing apartment buildings in Estonia. This paper describes the new grant scheme and measures to avoid and overcome the main problems which occurred in previous grant schemes.