Property owners are currently facing a complex challenge. On the one hand, there are traditional maintenance plans, where the service life of building components, technical risks and capital planning determine when measures are to be implemented. On the other hand, there are the new European requirements for energy efficiency under the EPBD, which have not yet been fully transposed into Swedish legislation and are therefore perceived as unclear. Where these two logics intersect, growing uncertainty arises.
Many property owners describe the same dilemma: they want to avoid both under-renovating – and being forced to return to a building a few years later with new setting-up costs – and over-renovating, thereby tying up capital in unnecessarily expensive energy solutions. In practice, it is precisely this balancing act that determines whether reinvestment decisions lead to long-term value maximisation or to costly lock-ins.
Why does the gap arise?
Maintenance plans are designed to safeguard technical functionality and minimise the risk of operational disruptions over time. They are, by nature, conservative documents and are very rarely structured to address energy performance or the system-level requirements that the EPBD will introduce. Energy issues therefore tend to become a parallel track, handled separately and, at best, “matched” against ongoing maintenance needs.
This separation is one of the main reasons why energy efficiency measures are often undervalued in planning, despite the fact that they are frequently closely linked to the same building elements that are already due for intervention.
At the same time, the EPBD is not a conventional regulation that targets individual components. It focuses on the overall performance of the building: how different systems interact and whether specific energy classes or renovation levels are achieved. For property owners, this means that individual measures can no longer be assessed in isolation. Façade refurbishment, windows, ventilation, heating systems and control strategies all influence one another, and it is the final outcome that is assessed under the EPBD – not the individual parts.
Two risks at the same decision point
When maintenance planning does not integrate the energy perspective, two mirror-image risks arise. The first is under-investment: a façade is refurbished without taking the opportunity to improve energy performance, only for the owner to return a few years later to erect new scaffolding and carry out further interventions in order to comply with the EPBD.
The second risk is over-investment: highly advanced technical solutions are implemented that go beyond the building’s actual needs and therefore fail to deliver a reasonable return in terms of energy savings or increased asset value. Both extremes lead to costs that could easily have been avoided through a more integrated analysis.
What is missing: decision support that links technology, energy and economics
What is increasingly being called for within the sector is a structured approach that makes it possible to take sound decisions in this uncertain middle ground. Decision support is needed that clearly shows how maintenance needs, energy performance and economic consequences are interconnected. Such a framework must be able to simulate a building’s energy performance, translate likely EPBD levels into concrete thresholds, and demonstrate what different packages of measures mean for energy use over time.
Equally important is that this integrated decision support incorporates a value perspective. Traditional maintenance plans account for costs, but not for benefits. When a life-cycle analysis based on the Net Present Value (NPV) method is applied, the picture becomes much clearer. Costs of energy measures, future energy savings, required rates of return, lower operating costs and avoided mobilisation costs are all consolidated into a single present value.
It is often only at this stage that it becomes clear that a combined measure, for example façade refurbishment together with energy improvements, delivers higher value over the building’s life cycle than a simpler technical maintenance solution. NPV also reduces the risk of over-investment, as it highlights when an energy solution fails to generate sufficient returns.
Acting today – even before the regulatory framework is finalised
Property owners do not need to wait until all aspects of the EPBD have been fully implemented in national legislation. Already today, it is possible to adopt a more strategic approach and build a robust position ahead of future requirements.
A first step is to work with scenarios. By simulating two or three plausible EPBD levels, owners can identify which buildings are close to a potential threshold and therefore sensitive to incorrect prioritisation. This, in turn, indicates which upcoming maintenance measures should be complemented with energy improvements in order to avoid costly return visits in the future.
A second step is to systematically evaluate packages of measures using energy modelling and the NPV method. This makes it possible to compare “maintenance only” with “maintenance plus energy efficiency” on an economically fair basis. The difference between these scenarios often lies not in the energy savings themselves, but in the value of avoiding repeated mobilisation and site establishment. In many cases, the avoided costs exceed the direct energy gains, which is precisely why traditional calculations often lead to misleading conclusions.
A third step is to focus on measures that deliver multiple benefits: technical, energy-related and economic. When façades, windows, ventilation and heating systems are already due for intervention, energy improvements become a natural part of the same package. With the right analysis, it becomes clear which components deliver the greatest value – and which do not. This is the essence of a modern, life-cycle-oriented property strategy.
From uncertainty to control
It is easy to feel concerned about changes that are not yet fully defined. But there is no need to wait for final regulations. By working in an integrated way with maintenance planning, energy simulation and life-cycle valuation, property owners can significantly improve their decision-making already today.
The objective is not to predict exactly how the EPBD will ultimately be formulated, but to build robust decision models that remain valid regardless of where the final thresholds are set. Property owners who develop this capability now, and begin planning with technology, energy and economics in a single framework, will be far better prepared when the EPBD requirements are clarified.
In practice, this means moving away from a fragmented view of maintenance and energy issues, and instead seeing the building as a whole: where each measure affects the others, and where long-term value is at least as important as short-term cost.
What is NPV – and why is it relevant for property owners?
NPV, or the Net Present Value method, is a way of evaluating investments over their entire life span. Instead of focusing solely on upfront costs, NPV takes into account all future cash flows: year-by-year energy savings, changes in operating costs, reduced capacity tariffs, residual values and, crucially, avoided future costs associated with return visits and new site establishment.
These values are converted into a single “present value” using a discount rate. The key point is that NPV identifies which package of measures delivers the highest economic value over time – not simply the lowest initial investment cost.
For property owners combining maintenance and energy improvements, NPV is what makes the difference between viewing energy efficiency as a cost and recognising it as a value-creating investment. When façades, roofs, windows or building services are already due for renewal, NPV is often the clearest way to demonstrate that “maintenance plus energy improvement” can be more profitable than technical maintenance alone.
The NPV method is seamlessly integrated into BIM Energy, allowing both energy and economic impacts to be assessed in parallel when a building is analysed in the software.
Author: Johnny Kronvall, Senior Advisor at StruSoft AB and Professor Emeritus of Building Technology