08-02-08 

The European Commission is still working on a way to relax the strict interpretation of the ERDF Regulation (1080/2006) which states, in Article 7, that housing expenses are  eligible only in new Member States.

The idea would be to modify the implementing Regulation for Structural Funds (1828/2006), through the “comitology” procedure, to re-qualify expenditure for energy efficiency and the use of renewable energy in housing as energy expenses, and no longer consider them as housing expenses. As a result, all EU member states could be eligible to present energy measures for buildings to ERDF. The flexibility that the Commission could show for energy expenses will most likely be limited to highly effective or particularly innovative investments

The Commission is expected to get to a conclusion in April.