Smart Readiness Indicator (SRI) – background and current developments

The climate protection targets and the associated push to use renewable energy sources to create greater independence from fossil fuels gave rise to the first “intelligent buildings” even before the 2000s. The economic crisis of 2008 and stricter CO2 emission targets increased international awareness of the term “smart building” and the importance of “smart” energy services increased. In the context of energy supply and use, this meant the energy-efficient use of energy and the lowest possible energy losses in the “smart” operation of buildings.

From around 2010, the year of the first revision, or “recast” or “amendment”, of the original version of the Energy Performance of Buildings Directive (EPBD 2002) – known as the “EU Buildings Directive” for short – research was carried out in international research projects on the more flexible use and utilization of renewable energy sources in the energy system and in buildings, thus establishing “smart energy technologies”. For example, the IEA Joint Project SHC Task 40 / ECBCS Annex 52 ‘Towards Net Zero Energy Solar Buildings’ focused on the load adjustment and grid interaction of buildings; in the UK, considerations on demand adjustments using tariffs were launched; in Denmark, several projects were carried out to demonstrate the smart grid control of houses with and without heat pumps and in Germany on the use of smart energy systems.

“Smart” buildings only found their way into the European Commission’s directives with the revision of the EPBD in 2018. While the words “smart” or “intelligent” did not appear at all in the EPBD 2010, and “automation” was only mentioned once at the end of Article 8(2), the word “smart” was already mentioned 23 times in the text of the EPBD 2018, and “building automation and control system” was mentioned 7 times. This means that energy efficiency and smart energy services have become more closely linked, and it has given added impetus to the development of focusing not only on building envelope and ventilation losses, but also on building services and energy supply via the Buildings Directive.

Current developments at EU level

The European Commission (EC) has now been pushing for around 10 years on the basis of the “Clean Energy for All Europeans” package of measures from 2016, the “European Green Deal“^[1] from 2019 and the “Clean Industrial Deal” from 2025^[2] in the building sector, the interlinking of smart technologies with a high proportion of renewable energies and energy efficiency. The assessment of a building’s “smart readiness” using an indicator should also contribute to this in order to make it fit for the future requirements of renewable energy networks and the needs of users.

With the EPBD in June 2018, the European Commission then introduced a “Smart Readiness Indicator” (SRI) as an optional assessment of buildings in Article 8(10) and Annex IA. A consortium led by the Flemish Institute for Technological Research NV (VITO) has presented a proposal for the calculation methodology for the EC/DG Ener in two studies.

At EU level, a decision on the methodology of an SRI based on these studies was adopted at the end of December 2020 and brought into force by regulation from January 1, 2021. This also marked the start of the test phase announced in Article 8(11) of the EPBD 2018, in which the member states can optionally participate. Austria was the first EU member state to officially participate in this test phase. Since fall 2021, there has been an ‘SRI platform’ for interested federal states and stakeholders, which is managed by another consortium around VITO for the EC/DG Ener. Article 15(2) of the EPBD 2024 now requires the optional EC methodology for large non-residential buildings from 2027. ^[3]

Development in Austria

Developments on the Smart Readiness Indicator (SRI) are therefore well advanced at EU level, and the above-mentioned test phase with parallel active European projects is currently running very intensively.

Austria addressed SRI at an early stage in several projects. Since 2016, parallel to the EU, activities have been carried out on “smart readiness” in buildings – this was prompted by the international project “Annex 67: Energy Flexible Buildings” as part of the IEA’s EBC program. When discussing the energy flexibility of buildings to support the use of renewable energy sources and reduce CO2 emissions, it became clear that a “Smart Readiness Indicator” should focus precisely on this objective. A position paper on this was written in 2017 with Austrian support^[4]. The following year, the “SRI Austria” project was launched in Austria, the findings of which were also published in 2020. [5]

Since then, several organizations have analyzed the topic for Austria in various studies and projects, which are briefly described in an issue of “energy innovation austria” (issue 2/2023)^[6].

Outlook

Proposals to supplement the method proposed by the EU for implementing the SRI are currently being developed in the ongoing test phase. Austria is very actively represented in the SRI platform – the OIB has taken on a coordinating role here in consultation with the BMWET. In 2026, the findings of the member states from their test phases will be collected by the European Commission and submitted to the EU Parliament and the EU Council in a report in the middle of the year. This and a revision of the legal acts adopted in 2020 by 2027 at the latest, with a focus on an obligation to specify the SRI for large non-residential buildings, were announced in the EPBD 2024.

This article was written as part of the SRI Demo project with support from the Climate and Energy Fund and the SRI2MARKET project with support from the European Commission’s EU-LIFE program as well as the project partners AEE INTEC, BOKU, IBO, FHTW, AIT and TU Vienna involved in the projects.

[6] energy innovation austria: Smart Readiness Indicator of buildings European and national activities, issue 2/2023. https://www.energy-innovation-austria.at/article/smart-readiness-indicator-von-gebaeuden/, accessed on 05.08.2025