The Technical Inspection of Buildings as an instrument for the energy improvement of existing buildings

The regulatory framework of the Spanish Technical Building Inspection (Inspeccion Tecnica de Edificios, ITE) has recently been modified in order to adapt it to the new needs in the buildings refurbishment field, broadening its focus from solely on the conservation state to include issues such as energy certification and accessibility. Currently, this procedure has a new name: Buildings Evaluation Report (Informe de Evaluacion de los Edificios, IEE). In this article the potential of this instrument in promoting energy savings in household is discussed. However, the ITE legislation is not enough, since there are a large number of municipalities in which this procedure has not yet been established. Strategies are proposed to overcome this barrier and to ensure that these technical reports are implemented at large scale; otherwise the expected energy savings induced by the ITE in the residential park will hardly be achieved.