According to a Savills report, emissions could be halved if “all properties were upgraded
through improvements to their current estimated EPC potential” (Williams, E., 2021). Since
2018, following a European Commission directive, a Minimum Energy Efficiency Standard
(MEES) was implemented, making it illegal to rent out properties with an EPC rating below E.
However, in September 2023, the post-Brexit UK government scrapped its plans to increase
the MEES, despite research showing that properties below a C rating incur an “inefficiency
penalty” (Phillips, J., Britchfield, C., & Guertler, P., 2022).
At the time, Prime Minister Rishi Sunak stated: “While we will continue to subsidize energy
efficiency – we’ll never force any household to do it” (UK Government, 2023). The scrapped
objectives had aimed to raise the minimum rating from E to C for new tenancies by 2025 and
all tenancies by 2028. Now, the newly elected government of July 4th, 2024, hopes to end
“the climate and energy chaos [and put an end to] 14 years of failed policies” (Labour
Manifesto, 2024) by reinstating the EPC MEES objectives, though with a new target of 2030
instead of 2025/28. This back-and-forth has left many questioning the necessity of these EPCs,
with some calling them a landlords’ “headache” (Harvey, E., 2024).
The aims of this paper are not political, but the claims made by Savills’ research team highlight
the importance of EPC minimum thresholds as a government policy to reduce emissions.
Therefore, this research analyses the efficacy of EPC minimum standards in changing non-
domestic EPC ratings across England, which has the most abundant EPC data since 2008. This
will provide evidence-based recommendations that could be useful to future policymakers
5 | P a g e
and, at the very least, end a decade of headaches and confusion in the commercial real estate
industry.
