Energy performance certificates: rules and validity

A Swedish energy performance certificate — energideklaration — is a statutory description of a building's energy use, produced by an independent certified energy expert and registered with Boverket, the national board of housing, building and planning. It is valid for ten years and is required for, among others, buildings let or held under a right of use, larger buildings frequently visited by the public, new buildings, and buildings being sold. The rules are in the Act (2006:985) on energy performance certificates for buildings and its ordinance (2006:1592).

Which buildings need one

Situation	Requirement
A building where a right of use is granted, for example a tenancy or a co-operative right	Must have a valid certificate
A building over 250 square metres frequently visited by the public	Must have a valid certificate, and the summary must be displayed
A newly erected building	Must be certified once the building is taken into use
A building or share being sold	The seller must ensure a certificate no older than ten years exists
A building or part offered for letting or sale	Energy performance must be stated in the advertisement

Exemptions exist — among others for certain industrial plants, buildings intended for worship, holiday homes and small buildings. If you are unsure whether a specific building is covered, Boverket's own page on which buildings must be certified is the source that governs, not this one. See also coverage across a portfolio.

What the certificate contains

Beyond energy use, a certificate contains several items that tend to surprise a first-time reader:

The building's energy performance expressed as a primary energy number, and the energy class A–G that number produces. See energy class A–G.
Reference values showing how the building compares with similar buildings and with the requirement for new construction.
A statement of whether mandatory ventilation control has been carried out in the building.
A statement of whether a radon measurement has been carried out.
Recommendations for cost-effective measures, where such exist. See the recommendations.
A summary to be displayed prominently in buildings to which the public has access.

The two middle points are worth pausing on: the certificate is one of very few documents where ventilation status and radon status sit alongside energy data for the same building. That makes it a useful starting point when mapping a portfolio you have just taken over.

Ten years — and why the date is easy to miss

Validity runs from when the certificate was produced, not from the calendar year and not from when it was registered in your own system. A building certified in November 2017 expires in November 2027, and nothing reminds you.

In a portfolio of hundreds of buildings this becomes a dispersion problem rather than a date problem: expiry dates are spread across ten years because the buildings were certified at different times, often in connection with different events. The only durable answer is to read the date per building and track it there. See the annual calendar of statutory inspections.

Do we need a new certificate if the building is renovated?

The law ties the requirement to the ten-year validity, not to alterations as such — a valid certificate does not become invalid because the building is renovated. After a substantial energy measure, however, it no longer describes the building, and at a sale or letting it is the stated energy performance that meets the market. If you have changed the heating system, added insulation or installed heat recovery, a new certificate is often worth the money for that reason alone, because an improved energy class is what shows in the listing.

A certificate is not an energy audit

Two things frequently bundled into one quotation, answering different questions:

	Energy performance certificate	Energy audit
Why	Legal requirement under 2006:985	Voluntary decision support
What it gives	Energy performance, class, reference values, recommendations	Detailed analysis of where the energy goes
Who does it	Certified independent energy expert	Energy consultant, no certification required
Registered	Yes, with Boverket	No

You need the certificate regardless. You need the audit when making an investment decision — the certificate's recommendations are rarely deep enough for that, as described in the recommendations.

Four common errors in existing certificates

When going through a portfolio it is usually the same things that are wrong, and all four can be spotted without visiting the building:

The certificate is linked to the property, not the building. One property designation can hold several buildings with different performance. The requirement applies per building — see building or property.
The data describes a building that has since been altered. The certificate is still valid, but it no longer describes reality.
Heated floor area or heating method is registered incorrectly, which makes both the performance and the class wrong — and therefore the energy class in a future listing too.
Nobody has read the expiry date. This is the most common of all: the certificate exists, but nobody knows it expires in fourteen months.

Errors 1 and 4 are pure register questions and therefore the cheapest to fix. Errors 2 and 3 require someone to compare the certificate with the building.

Who may produce one

Only an independent certified energy expert may produce a certificate, and it must be registered in Boverket's energy certificate register. The independence requirement is real and not a formality — it rules out the party selling a measure also certifying its effect.

Registration also means the data sits with a public authority and is accessible. That distinguishes the energy certificate from ventilation control, where no national register exists.

What Emphyx does with certificates

We extract the fields from the certificate PDF and query Boverket's open register, so that energy performance, energy class, expiry date and the underlying data land per building rather than in a document folder. See energy certificates in Emphyx.

What is not a system question: the certificate must still be produced by a certified energy expert, and the measures must still be carried out. With a handful of buildings a calendar reminder is enough; it is the portfolio with hundreds of scattered expiry dates that needs more.

If the certificate is missing entirely, read what happens then. If the building is being sold: energy certificates when selling.