“With an electrical source of one kilowatt hour, a heat pump using water can produce up to 4.5 kilowatt hours of heat. This remains a valid solution, even in the event of electricity price rises,” explains François Guisan, who manages a sustainable development advice bureau in Geneva. Ideally, this system is powered by solar panels. In Geneva, there is a building made up of 260 rental apartments which uses this type of heating solution, for example. “If the boiler renovation goal is set at 25 years, the renovation rate should be 4 percent, but it is currently closer to 2.3 percent,” calculates Fabrice Rognon, a member of the committee of the Groupement professionnel suisse pour les PAC (Swiss professional association for heat pumps). The engineer also draws attention to the installation of oil boilers in new builds. “To reach zero carbon emissions, we need to stop installing fossil fuel boilers altogether!” Households hostage to fossil fuel energies Concern over the costs of non-fossil-fuel heating plays a crucial role in this phenomenon. “A gas or oil boiler costs less, but over time, a heating system using a heat pump will be more economical, not forgetting that households’ exposure to the costs of fossil fuel energies is high, with rising prices,” points out Guisan. This specialist recently led the energy renovation of a luxurious home in the Geneva countryside. The boiler consumed 9,000 litres of oil per year. The installation of pellet-fueled heating cost 80,000 Swiss francs. The advantages? Produced in Switzerland, wood is less expensive than oil, and its greenhouse gas emissions are up to ten times lower than fossil fuels. In this canton, the installation of oil boilers is prohibited as of 2022. The question of the costs of energy renovations obviously concerns those renting properties. “In order to carry out renovations, it will be necessary to increase the rent, which tenants will reject. Landlords will first have to accept that in ten years, the results of mortgage rate drops have not been translated into their rent prices. Pro-tenant lobbyists will also have to step up and do something about this, because in the end, the renovation will be more economical than the status quo,” reasons Stéphane Genoud. Promoting energy renovation professions Switzerland does not have enough trained individuals to carry out this work. “We are missing 300,000 installers,” estimates the professor from the canton of Valais, who mentions having developed a work and training programme aimed at young, unemployed graduates in the Maghreb region. “They would return to their country after a few years spent working in Switzerland with skills and capital.” Genoud highlights the fact that a number of professions are set to gradually disappear. “With electric cars, mechanics will no longer be as useful. They could install solar panels instead,” he argues. Marc Muller, manager of a company specialising in energy renovation in Yverdon, envisages a sort of movement. “A student who has finished their studies in sociology and who is planning to leave to complete a world tour on their bike could be advised to become a carpenter,” he suggests. He emphasises that there is already a five-to-eight-year waiting list for the energy renovations for large buildings. For Genoud, the training system in Switzerland should encourage professions related to renovations. “Installing heat pumps is an attractive profession which pays well,” he confirms. Rejected at a referendum in 2021, the law on CO2 provided for support mechanisms for renovation works. “The Confederation should buy heat pumps by lots of 10,000, like it did for masks during Covid-19,” suggests the Valais professor. Because another shortage is looming, which also concerns solar panels and insulation materials. In April, the Environment, Spatial Planning and Energy Committee of the National Council declared itself in favour of an indirect counter-project to the glaciers initiative, a text which advocated a linear reduction of greenhouse gases to achieve zero carbon in 2050. The counter-project in question suggested the implementation by the Confederation of an extraordinary programme worth 2 billion francs over ten years to replace the installation of fossil fuel boilers and to facilitate the energy-efficient renovation of buildings. A chimney sweep cleans an oil furnace and has many more to do. Although they are growing obsolete, a surprising number of new oil heating systems are being installed. Photo: Keystone Swiss Review / October 2022 / No.5 19
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