site.btaUPDATED Bulgaria Needs "Quantum Leap" in Buildings' Renovation - Deputy Minister of Regional Development

A "quantum leap" in the renovation of the building stock is to be made in Bulgaria. This has been talked about for a long time, but has not yet been implemented. The scale needed to make this possible cannot be provided with the current 100% grant funding, Deputy Regional Development and Public Works Minister Angelina Boneva said during the National Renovation Day.

The forum was held at the Bulgarian Construction Chamber in Sofia on Thursday for the fourth consecutive year and was organized by the Renovate Bulgaria Association, which is the national partner of the European communications campaign Renovate Europe. 

According to Boneva, there are objective obstacles to large-scale renovation, which is evident by the fact that there are over 3,000 project proposals for renovation submitted under the National Recovery and Resilience Plan (NRRP) worth more than BGN 4 billion, while the allocated resources for that are just BGN 1 billion. 

"Such a pace is not sufficient to meet the targets under the NRRP, nor those we have set ourselves as a country in the long-term strategy. They also do not meet the targets that come with the next wave of amendments to European directives and the requirements of the Fit for 55 package [a set of proposals to revise and update EU legislation and implement new initiatives with the aim of ensuring that EU policies are in line with the climate goals agreed by the Council and the European Parliament], explained the Deputy Regional Development Minister.

Boneva said that changing the model which fully covers the costs of housing and building renovation projects, does not mean a complete withdrawal of public funds from this process. "Grant aid will remain part of the support and this is visible both at national and European level," Deputy Minister Boneva said. "Public funds will remain part of this funding. But it is also important that all actors are involved in the process."

According to Ivaylo Alexiev, Executive Director of the Agency for Sustainable Energy Development (ASDE), there are country-specific factors that prevent adequate and fast renovation are fragmented ownership, the high rate of unoccupied housing - in some settlements that rate is as high as 40%), poor maintenance of buildings over the years, low incomes of occupants of multi-family buildings. And the poor state of the country's building stock stems from the slack requirements for housing owners, Alexiev argued.