Swiss Federal Office of Energy
SFOE, founded in 1930, is Switzerland’s competence centre in terms of energy supply and use. It operates under the Federal Department of the Environment, Transport, Energy and Communications (DETEC). Their objective is to ensure a broad-based and crisis-proof energy supply, while promoting energy efficiency and renewable energy sources to occupy a greater share of the energy supply.
Energy efficiency is the use of less energy to perform the same task or produce the same result. Energy-efficient homes and buildings use less energy to heat, cool, and run appliances and electronics, and energy-efficient manufacturing facilities use less energy to produce goods1. It is therefore a crucial component of any national energy strategy.
Thermal insulation is one such application of the energy efficiency principle, as it reduces the amount of energy needed to keep a building heated. As such our interaction with the SFOE mainly revolved around this concept.
We learnt about three key points: The feasibility of the current energy strategy and energy habits, the priorities of the SFOE in regards to the insulation materials and the place of energy efficiency in the overall energy strategy.
According to the SFOE, the goals set by the Swiss Energy Strategy 2050 aiming for a carbon neutral Switzerland amongst other things, are not attainable under the current circumstances. This is due to a lack of ambitious goals from the cantons and the inefficiency of the current laws, hence the current revision of three laws: the law on CO2, the law on energy and the law on renewable energy permits. For us this revelation was crucial. The revision of a failing policy and a need for more ambitious goals confirmed our conviction to develop a sustainable and high-performance insulation material.
Energy efficiency is not listed as a priority in the Energy Strategy 2050 (instead it focuses on the replacement of fossil fuel dependent heating systems). Yet SFOE confirmed that it still occupies a key point in the overall national strategy. The energy efficiency of existing and new buildings is a pillar for the reduction of energy demand.
For the national strategy, the properties of the insulation material and the material itself are effectively irrelevant so long as the desired low lambda value is achieved. This was an important point for us, as it might keep our material unhindered from the usual prejudice against GMO produced and related materials. It is also on the lambda value criteria that SFOE decides on how to subsidise innovation projects. This tells us that our choice of aerogel as baseline material was correct, and to keep our lambda value acquired from our thermal conductivity tests as low as possible with each iteration of the aerogel optimisation cycle.
With the upcoming energy crisis in mind, SFOE believes that people in Switzerland will pay more attention to being energy efficient. Already, the difference between communes which have invested in energy efficiency and which haven’t are becoming clear as the energy supply is put under uncertainty. Energy efficiency and energy strategies will play a key role for humanity in the upcoming years, and efficient and sustainable insulation materials will be an important asset to have.
References
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Energy Efficiency