Sweden leads the way in the European Union in terms of the use of renewable energy to power heating and cooling, with 69.3%, largely through the use of biomass and heat pumps, new data has found.
Estonia (65.4%) ranks second, again mainly relying on biomass and heat pumps, while in Latvia (61.0%), energy is largely provided by biomass, the Eurostat data showed.
Lowest share
The lowest share of renewable energy for heating and cooling was recorded in Ireland at 6.3%, with the Netherlands at 8.6% and Belgium at 10.4% also indicating low percentages.
Compared with 2021, the largest increases were seen in Malta (+5.2 percentage points), Luxembourg (+2.5 percentage points), and Ireland (+1.4 percentage points).
Meanwhile, decreases were observed in Austria (-2.4 percentage points), Slovenia (-1.2 percentage points), and Cyprus (-1.0 percentage points).
Renewable energy sources accounted for 24.8% of the European Union’s heating and cooling needs in 2022, marking a 1.8 percentage point increase from the previous year’s figure of 23.0%, according to the data.
Heating and cooling constitute approximately half of the bloc’s total gross energy consumption.
EU Directive
However, further efforts are necessary for the EU to meet the targets outlined by EU Directive 2023/2413, known as RED III.
Passed in October 2023, this directive mandates Member States to raise their annual average share of renewables in heating and cooling by at least 0.8 percentage points from 2021 to 2025, and by at least 1.1 percentage points from 2026 to 2030.
