Holistic models and decision-making frameworks provide the groundwork for stimulating policymaking that integrates several policy goals, for example concerning biodiversity, climate change mitigation, and energy. However, it is unclear under which circumstances such integrated frameworks get adopted by policymaking.
In a recent study, project partners from TU Delft examined the political processes behind integrating climate policy into the European Union’s Energy Performance of Buildings Directive (EPBD) in 2024. The analysis shows that the EPBD represents a significant step toward climate policy integration. This progress was driven mainly by issue salience and strong political leadership, and surprisingly not by an increase in integrative governance capacities. However, such capacities hold great potential to accelerate climate policy integration in the building sector, ultimately enabling a faster reduction in greenhouse gas emissions.
You can check out the published version in Policy Sciences: https://rdcu.be/ePkFj