Data on nearly zero energy buildings (NZEBs) projects and best practices in Europe.

This data article refers to the paper "Assessing Nearly zero energy buildings (NZEBs) development in Europe" [1]. Data linked with this article relate to collected best practices NZEBs throughout Europe. Data on building geometry, year of construction or renovation, primary energy consumption, saving percentages, renewable production, heating demand are provided. Data allow an overview of the status of most commonly implemented efficiency measures and renewables in NZEBs. In particular, data are available in relation technologies, such as heating, domestic hot water, lighting, renewable sources, ventilation, cooling. Heat recovery efficiency data are also collected. U-values are detailed for roofs, walls, floors, windows. Further data can be visualized in relation to technologies costs, cost of construction and maintenance.

Data on mitigation policies at local level within the Covenant of Mayors' monitoring emission inventories.

This data article relates to and complement the research paper: "Assessment of climate change mitigation policies in 315 cities in the Covenant of Mayors initiative" [1]. The reported data has been collected and elaborated within the framework of the Covenant of Mayors (CoM) initiative. The dataset is extracted from the overall database of the initiative reported through the platform MyCovenant. The data deals with the Monitoring Emission Inventories submitted by local authorities by 2016. Data has been processed and elaborated to highlights specific features of signatories and the policies they have adopted in the development of their Sustainable Energy Action Plans (SEAP). Available data relates to the mitigation policies in the SEAPs and includes their carbon reduction potential, the status of implementation and the class of governance. The CoM gathers together thousands of local authorities who voluntary committed to decarbonisation and increase resilience in their territory. Therefore, this data can be of interest for local policy makers and urban planners to identify successful examples in cities with comparable contexts and to identify possible measures in several sectors for climate change mitigation.

Impacts of a climate change initiative on air pollutant emissions: Insights from the Covenant of Mayors.

The Covenant of Mayors (CoM) is a successful European initiative which encourages local authorities to be proactive in fighting climate change. Recently, it expanded to cover adaptation and energy access/poverty and became a global initiative. In this study we investigate an additional perspective: synergies and trade-offs between climate and air quality. Signatories pledge to reduce their Greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and voluntarily report their emissions, energy consumption and the measures that they carry out to reach their goals. We develop a methodology to estimate air pollutant emissions corresponding to CO2 emissions CoM signatories report, using information they already submit and national estimates of air pollutant emission factors. The methodology is applied to over 1600 signatories in Europe, representing over 80 million inhabitants. Results show that, in general, signatories are reducing both types of emissions. However, there are also cases where emissions increase. We explore the reasons behind these changes and highlight the role of technological improvement. This work calls for an increased coherence between climate and air quality plans at the local scale and provides a first step and a tool to support signatories, even the smallest ones, to move in this direction.

Data on European non-residential buildings.

This data article relates to the research paper Energy consumption and efficiency technology measures in European non-residential buildings (D'Agostino et al., 2017) [1]. The reported data have been collected in the framework of the Green Building Programme that ran from 2006 to 2014. The project has encouraged the adoption of efficiency measures to boost energy savings in European non-residential buildings. Data focus on the one-thousand buildings that joined the Programme allowing to save around 985 GWh/year. The main requirement to join the Programme was the reduction of at least 25% primary energy consumption in a new or retrofitted building. Energy consumption before and after the renovation are provided for retrofitted buildings while, in new constructions, a building had to be designed using at least 25% less energy than requested by the country's building codes. The following data are linked within this article: energy consumption, absolute and relative savings related to primary energy, saving percentages, implemented efficiency measures and renewables. Further information is given about each building in relation to geometry, envelope, materials, lighting and systems.