ATP sustain accompanied Austria’s first EU taxonomy-compliant existing object

During the cooperative project involving ATP sustain, the ÖGNI, and the VIG, the building in downtown Vienna was selected for a pilot project, the aim of which was to carry out a sample check of the EU taxonomy requirements for an existing building.

So what requirements must be fulfilled?

The EU Taxonomy Regulation 2020/852 is a system for classifying capital flows, whose aim is to proactively steer economic activity in a “green” direction. To this end, requirements for the building sector are defined in terms of six environmental objectives – climate protection, adaptation to climate change, protection of water resources, circular economy, environmental protection, and biodiversity and ecosystems – plus additional minimum requirements such as compliance with the OECD Guidelines and the UN Guiding Principles. Depending upon the degree of compliance with the criteria, the object is rated as requiring transformation or taxonomy-conform.

Existing buildings for which, according to the EU Taxonomy Regulation, disclosure and reporting are mandatory, must meet not only the generally applicable minimum requirements but also the first two environmental objectives climate protection and adaptation to climate change. In addition to this, a ‘special contribution’ must be made (and, hence, even stricter requirements met) for one of these two environmental objectives. In the pilot project “Singerstraße 8”, the first environmental objective – climate protection – was chosen for this special contribution. Here, one speaks of “Appendix I”.

I. Climate protection
The focus of the first environmental objective is compliance with the threshold value of NRPE (non-renewable primary energy), as set out in current climate protection legislation. According to Appendix I, this threshold value must be undercut by at least 10 %. This requirement is a serious challenge for existing buildings.
The selected pilot project is served by Vienna’s municipal district heating system, which operates as a highly-efficient cogeneration system, as defined by current climate protection legislation. This means that the threshold value for the property is significantly undercut, which clearly represents the necessary ‘special contribution’ to the meeting of climate protection objectives.

II. Adaptation to climate change
The attempt to achieve taxonomy-compliance also required an analysis of the main climate risks facing the location. In the event of an increased risk, measures must be openly taken to protect the building and its users. As well as investigating today’s risks it is also necessary to investigate risks for 2030 and 2050 in terms of the known RCP (representative concentration) of 2.6, 4.5, and 8.5. These RCP scenarios provide information about the relationship between increases in radiation and climate protection measures.
Scenario RCP2.6 combines extensive measures and a low increase in radiation whereas RCP8.5 is “business as usual”, with no special measures but with a strong increase in radiation.

The relevant climate risks were analyzed by ATP sustain and summarized in a Climate Risk Report. We couldn’t identify any major risks to the location in the required period. According to current knowhow, the building is subject to no particular danger and can be classified as taxonomy-compliant.

How was the analysis carried out?
The building’s ability to meet the relevant criteria was investigated in a pre-check. On the basis of this we drew up a Taxonomy Report about the property, in which the relevant proofs were presented in context and the level of compliance was revealed. In a final step, we submitted the entire report to the ÖGNI for independent, third-party verification in order to confirm this optimum resilience of the building qualities.