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Sweden, like other countries, has set ambitious national targets for both energy efficiency and conservation of heritage values in the built environment. However, how these policies are implemented on a local level and how they affect each other is not known. This study aims to argue that extensive energy-saving policies can have unintentional impacts not just on the built environment but also on conservation practice.

By using a longitudinal approach, the aim is to investigate the possibilities of conserving the built environment when policies for increased energy efficiency are implemented in existing urban areas. The methodology used is qualitative, applying a combination of study of public records, policy documents, interviews with public officials and ocular investigation of buildings in three areas located in two different municipalities.

The study suggests that extensive refurbishments not only have effects on the character of an area, but in extension, affect how urban planners and local authorities approach the development in the same area. Urban areas affected by extensive retrofits in the past seem to be managed in less detail, leaving existing policy measures on both energy and heritage untapped.

This is a study concerning two Swedish municipalities. Furthermore, it is limited to one specific policy measure, energy-saving subsidies provided in the 1970s and 1980s. The generalisability of the findings may, therefore, be limited. Despite this, the findings provide an important indication of the relationship between energy-saving policies in the past and urban planning practice of existing urban areas today, as well as the importance of alignment between policy-making and implementation.

Policy instruments for the building stock and the practice of conservation planning have not worked well together. Due to local practice, energy subsidies provided in the 1970s and 1980s still today have a negative effect on both heritage conservation and energy efficiency in existing areas.

There is a discrepancy between expectations and outcome of policy measures. National decision-makers overestimate the possibilities to control the development on a local level, for both energy efficiency and heritage values. By examining an innovative set of sources, acknowledging long-term effects and entanglements of policies and practice, this study contributes to a better understanding of the complexity of different values in the built environment.

By comparing the share of approved applications, as well as completed energy retrofits, this study demonstrates that the effects of the national energy subsidy policy differed significantly between urban areas. Areas with a high degree of approved subsidies also had a high degree of retrofits, suggesting that the policy had intended effects. In these areas, the number of retrofits were also significantly higher than the number of subsidies. This was not the case where energy subsidies were fewer, which indicates that energy retrofits are performative, meaning that they accelerate further retrofits in the same area.

The purpose of this paper is to evaluate long-term effects of previous policies for energy efficiency on energy performance and heritage values. A further ambition is to better understand the relationship between energy and preservation by exploring a quantitative method of combining energy performance data with official heritage designation.

The study is based on a quantitative analysis of energy performance, completed additional insulations, and official heritage classification for individual buildings. Data have been collected and analysed for a sample consisting of 289 multi-family buildings heated with district heating and constructed 1940–1949 in an urban area in Stockholm, Sweden.

The data exhibit a significant correlation between the studied features. The study further shows that additional insulation has been installed in roughly half of the buildings. The large majority of them were carried out in the national programme for home improvement called ROT.

The findings indicate that previous policies for energy efficiency had an important effect on energy performance and heritage values in the studied area. They continue to affect urban planning and building permit administration today. Research of the physics of individual buildings would be needed in order to determine the reason for differences in the sample.

By presenting a novel method, the study provides a useful tool for policy makers to bridge the gap between issues of energy and preservation and adopt a more holistic approach towards a sustainable built environment.

Improving the energy performance of historic buildings has the potential to reduce carbon emissions while protecting built heritage through its continued use. However, implementing energy retrofits in these buildings faces social, economic, and technical barriers. The purpose of this conceptual paper is to present the approach of IEA-SHC Task 59 to address some of these barriers.

Task 59 aims to achieve the lowest possible energy demand for historic buildings. This paper proposes a definition for this concept and identifies three key socio-technical barriers to achieving this goal: the decision-makers’ lack of engagement in the renovation of historic buildings, a lack of support during the design process and limited access to proven retrofit solutions. Two methods – dissemination of best-practice and guidelines – are discussed in this paper as critical approaches for addressing the first two barriers.

An assessment of existing databases indicates a lack of best-practice examples focused specifically on historic buildings and the need for tailored information describing these case studies. Similarly, an initial evaluation of guidelines highlighted the need for process-oriented guidance and its evaluation in practice.

This paper provides a novel definition of lowest possible energy demand for historic buildings that is broadly applicable in both practice and research. Both best-practices and guidelines are intended to be widely disseminated throughout the field.