When Emmanuel Macron launched his bid for France's presidency more than four years ago, one of his pledges was to address fuel poverty and improve home insulation.
Progress has been slow so far.
Despite the country s commitment to the Paris climate goals in 2015, Macron s promise was an acknowledgment that France's own record on cutting energy use by households is not particularly impressive.
According to France's Ecological Transition Ministry, passoires thermiques are a term for dwellings ranked in the two lowest categories of the country s Energy Performance Certificate scheme, with ratings of F and G these passoires thermiques were estimated to make up nearly 17 per cent of the country s housing stock in 2018. A further 24 per cent were certified with a mediocre rating of E -- about the same proportion as those in the three highest categories. The properties built before 1948 account for almost 23 per cent of French housing, and almost 70 per cent of them have a rating of E or lower.
The problem is particularly acute in cities such as Paris, where many buildings from the Haussmann era of the mid 1800s are subject to protection on architectural grounds but are liable to leak heat from doors and windows.
Insulation requirements on new buildings in the city took effect in 1974. Planning rules prohibits the modification of exterior facades of protected buildings, requiring insulation to only be installed in interiors.
Macron's policy is driven by a combination of climate protection goals and longstanding concern over energy poverty, seen as an important component of economic deprivation across the country.
According to a report by France's Energy Poverty Observatory in the year 2019, 15 per cent of inhabitants reported suffering from cold for at least 24 hours during the winter of 2017. More than 8 per cent of the population's income went on home energy costs, according to 11.6 per cent of the population.
A report on France's progress toward net zero carbon emissions, published last week by the International Energy Agency, praised government plans and funding commitments to encourage retrofits. Over the past 20 years, many of the country s efficiency gains have come from more stringent building codes but renovation rates remain slow.
Since 2017, the Isolation 1 euro scheme has offered poorer households floor or loft insulation through commercial installers with costs reimbursed by the government.
The initiative has resulted in French households being bombarded by phone calls from businesses that claim to provide insulation under the one-euro scheme, many of them coming from scammers. The economy ministry issued a warning to consumers to beware of fraud and to ban cold calling by energy renovation providers. The current form of the scheme ended at the beginning of July.
The government has been obliged to give free re-certification to owners of up to 200,000 homes built before 1975 who have received incorrect ratings, including 80,000 categorised as F or G Last year, adding to the embarrassment. Macron said that the government had been hesitant to adopt more stringent proposals to improve the housing stock. There had been a ban on renting properties in the lowest F and G energy efficiency categories. The government feared it would penalise less well-off households and reduce the availability of rental properties.
In August of this year, the president's Climate and Resilience legislation, set up by the Citizen Climate Convention, has been finalized and has been implemented in the government's Climate and Resilience legislation. The law sets out a series of measures designed to increase pressure on owners of passoires thermiques.
From 2023, owners of homes classified as G will be barred from increasing the rental price of the property unless they take remedial insulation work. Two years after that, if they do not, the rental will be forbidden. This restriction will be applied to homes classified as F in 2028 and those with an E rating in 2034. Existing tenants will be able to require the landlord to install insulation to bring the property up to the minimum acceptable standard.
The vendors must commission an energy audit next year when single-family homes classified as F and G are sold. All households will have access to state-guaranteed loans to finance some of the cost renovations, although independent estimates suggest that bringing a G-rated dwelling up to D standard will cost a minimum of €50,000.
According to Fitch Ratings, these measures can lead to a discount in the sale of affected properties, although analysts note that price changes are likely to be gradual as only about 3 per cent of France's housing stock is sold each year.
There is evidence that owners are trying to unload energy-guzzling passoires thermal properties that are certified as E F or G before the legislation's rental ban takes effect, according to sale and rental online marketplace SeLoger.
In November, it reported that listings for sale of homes ranked as lowest for energy efficiency had soared in 23 of 40 cities surveyed. In October, listings of inefficient properties increased by 72 per cent compared to the same month in the same month the previous year. In Rennes, listings increased by 74 per and 70 per cent in Nantes.