Transforming Markets for Energy-Efficient Buildings in Russia and its Neighbors

This project seeks to promote energy efficiency in the Russian buildings sector through technical training, development of guidance materials on efficient building design, and catalysis of market-stimulation programs, all in conjunction with innovations in regional and federal Russian energy-efficiency codes.

The building sector accounts for about one-fourth of Russia’s total energy consumption. Energy in buildings is used primarily for heating, and secondarily for appliances, lighting, and domestic hot water. Energy efficiency is appallingly low relative to western standards; even on a climate-adjusted basis, Russian buildings consume about twice as much energy per unit of floor area as buildings in Canada, Sweden, or the United States.

This inefficiency is a severe drain on the struggling Russian economy and a particular burden to regional and municipal governments, most of which, astoundingly, still allocate about half of their budgets to residential heat subsidies. Russia's wasteful energy use also leads to local pollution and accumulation of climate-altering gases in the global atmosphere. Russia currently stands as the world's third-leading emitter of anthropogenic greenhouse gases, surpassed only by the United States and China.

The barriers to greater efficiency in Russian buildings are formidable. The indigenous Russian construction industry remains highly centralized, and consists largely of antiquated facilities too short on cash to make desperately needed upgrades. Building designers, who have for generations been expected to stand in passive acceptance of state-sanctioned standard designs, lack knowledge of advanced design techniques and new technologies, even those with emerging prospects in the Russian market. Among consumers, the scarcity of information is just as acute. Most apartments lack meters for heat consumption, even at the whole-building level; residents pay flat fees based on floor area, not actual use. Thus they have no way to identify conservation opportunities — and no cost incentive to pursue them.

Development of a flexible and innovative building-code model for Russia’s regions

Over the last ten years, IMT has joined the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) and the Moscow-based Center for Energy Efficiency (CENEf) in an effort to develop an innovative model energy-efficiency code for use in Russia. This model code is helping to surmount information barriers among designers, contractors, and consumers, resulting in buildings that are more cost-effective, comfortable, and environmentally friendly. The project team has worked with Russian regions, the Russian Federation government, and Russian NGOs to encourage adoption and enforcement of codes based on this model. Implementation of the model code is resulting in buildings that are up to 50% more thermally efficient than most existing building stock, and 40% more efficient than buildings minimally compliant with prior codes.

Aside from significant energy savings and pollution prevention, the model code offers several other powerful advantages. It generates major savings for regional and municipal governments. It gives greater flexibility to building designers in how to achieve compliance, leading to enhanced design creativity and cost optimization without sacrificing energy-conservation goals. The model code also includes detailed programs of inspection and enforcement, including material on advanced technologies heretofore unfamiliar to Russian building-code officials.

In May 1998, the Yaroslavl Oblast became the first of Russia’s regions to adopt regional building standards based on the model code. In the years since, a total of 53 regions accounting for more than 75% of all construction have adopted codes based on the model code. In 2003, the federal Russian government adopted SNiP 23-02 based on the model code.

More recently, IMT and its partners have begun to work to replicate our successes in Russia to Kazakhstan, Ukraine and other Newly Independent States. In 2004, the Commonwealth of Independent State’s Interstate Scientific-Technical Commission on Standardization, Technical Norms and Certification in Construction (known by its Russian abbreviation MNTKS) voted to adopt as MSN 2.04-02-2004 Russia’s SNiP 23-02, which is based on the team’s model code. "MSN" is the Russian abbreviation for "Interstate Building Code." The following countries ratified MSN 2.04-02-2004: Armenia, Moldavia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, and Russia.

The project is funded by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the Renewable Energy & Energy Efficiency Partnership (REEEP). IMT’s earlier work in Russia was funded from by Battelle Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) and the U.S. Department of Energy.

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