This week, we sit down with Ciarán Cuffe, co-chair of the European Green Party and former rapporteur on the landmark revision of the Energy Performance of Buildings Directive, to explore a question that fundamentally challenges how we think about European policy and the built environment: What if the single biggest barrier to transforming our buildings isn't our lack of scientific knowledge or technology—but our complete failure to recognise that the most ambitious building legislation in European history was negotiated through late night deals, diplomatic trilogues, and careful political capital management, and that unless we understand how policy actually gets made, keep decision makers accountable during implementation, and translate technical directives into language that resonates with families worried about healthy homes, even the most groundbreaking legislation will fail at the national level?
Key Topics Discussed:
From Architecture to the Brussels Machine: Ciarán brings a rare perspective, moving from architecture and local government in Dublin to national politics and finally to the European Parliament, where he landed what he calls a policy wonk paradise. As rapporteur for the EPBD recast, he spent two-thirds of his final two years in Europe negotiating what would become the most ambitious building law the continent has ever seen. The Greens threw everything at securing this file during the auction process for committee assignments. They didn't think they would get it, but they did. And it became the centrepiece of the European Green five years, alongside the European Climate Law and over 20 interconnected pieces of legislation covering everything from maritime fuels to energy trading.
Inside the Trilogues: European policymaking is not just about the parliament. It is about three institutions: the European Parliament, the Council of Member States, and the European Commission. Ciarán spent countless hours in meetings with Commission officials from DG Energy, attending Council meetings in Luxembourg where energy ministers gathered, and working the sidelines to convince national teams that specific provisions would work for Sweden, for Malta, for Cyprus. The final deals happened in late night trilogues, where representatives from all three bodies sat in a room with pieces of paper, writing down numbers and asking, can we live with a 16 percent energy reduction by 2030? People were on the phone back to ambassadors, back to capitals. Eventually, you get a deal done. But within a complex technical document, you win in some areas and lose in others.
The Affordability Backlash: Almost immediately after the recast was agreed, there was a political backlash on affordability. In Italy, Salvini, the Minister for Transport, declared that Brussels was going to take your home. It became a huge story. Ciarán and his team had to do outreach to major Italian newspapers like Sole 24 Ore to clarify that no, Brussels was not taking anyone's home, and in fact, Brussels would supply much of the money required for deep retrofits. The pushback showed that the directive had been pushed about as far as politically possible. If there had been no reaction, it would have meant they hadn't been ambitious enough.
Indoor Environmental Quality Enters the Directive: One of the most significant achievements of the recast is the embedding of indoor environmental quality as a fundamental pillar of building performance. This shift, recognised globally by the indoor air quality movement, moves buildings from being seen as units of energy to being seen as homes. Ciarán believes the pandemic helped make the case. High mortality rates in northern Italy, in overcrowded urban areas with poor outdoor and indoor air quality, made it stunningly obvious that we needed to focus on the quality of the spaces where people spend most of their lives. Many of his colleagues in Brussels were living in small apartments with no balconies, no private outdoor space. Improving indoor air quality became not just a health issue, but an equity issue.
GUEST:
Ciarán Cuffe
https://www.linkedin.com/in/ciarancuffe/The Air Quality Matters Podcast in Partnership with
Mann + Hummel https://www.mann-hummel.com/en.html Particles Plus https://particlesplus.com/
Eurovent (https://www.eurovent.eu/) - Aico (https://www.aico.co.uk/) - Lindab (https://www.lindab.ie/) - S&P UK (https://www.solerpalau.com/en-uk/)
The One Take Podcast in Partnership with
SafeTraces (https://www.safetraces.com/) - Inbiot (https://www.inbiot.es/?utm_campaign=simon&utm_source=airqualitymatters&utm_medium=podcast) - Farmwood (https://farmwood.co.uk/) - iE Electronics (https://www.eielectronics.ie/) and iAir Group (https://iair-group.com/)
Zehnder https://www.zehndergroup.com/en
Charity Partner - https://www.saferairproject.org/
