Buildings are responsible for 40% of energy consumption and 36% of greenhouse gas pollution.
The European Commission has set the energy renovation of buildings as one of its priorities.
And the Government wants to take advantage of EU funds to boost this chapter.
The economic vice president, Nadia Calviño, put figures on Thursday to the program that the Executive prepares and which she described as "massive": 5,300 million euros.
It will be a three-year urban rehabilitation and regeneration plan with the aim of making 480,000 homes more energy efficient.
The project will be financed exclusively with 70,000 million European funds, it is led by the Ministry of Transport, the Ministry of Energy participates and communities and municipalities collaborate.
The autonomies have the competence and the municipalities intervene in the development of the plans.
According to the José Luis Ábalos department, the first leg consists of the renovation of houses or buildings in the traditional way: a community of owners asks for help and then the work proceeds.
The second leg is based on the renovation of entire neighborhoods.
This program is orchestrated by consensus with the community and the City Council, and also includes the rehabilitation of common spaces.
In addition, within this block there will be specific actions for cities with less than 5,000 inhabitants in order to help emptied Spain.
The ministry stresses that the objective of these initiatives is mainly energy efficiency, but also to improve accessibility and social cohesion.
And a third leg is the rehabilitation of public buildings of the State, the communities and municipalities, with a special attention to health and educational buildings.
A smaller item is also reserved for the so-called Urban Agenda, which basically is summarized in aid to local corporations to design their urban planning plans and with them respond to problems of habitability, social housing, accessibility, mobility or energy efficiency.
In the Budgets there is already an annuity of these items, and the breakdown to three years is: 2,400 million for housing and neighborhoods;
500 million for cities with less than 5,000 inhabitants considering the demographic challenge;
1,080 million for community and town hall buildings;
1,000 for buildings of the State Administration;
20 for local entities to design their action plans for the Urban Agenda, and 300 for a call that has already been issued by the Institute for Energy Diversification.
At present some 30,000 homes are rehabilitated per year.
The plan would mean multiplying the figure by five until 2023. And according to calculations by the Higher Council of Colleges of Architects of Spain, some 400,000 jobs could be created.
Unlike other investments, home renovation is very job-creating and can serve as a stimulus to pull the economy up quickly.
Calviño mentioned this figure at Spain Investors Day, a forum organized by Estudio de Comunicación with the collaboration of BNP Paribas and the sponsorship, among others, of PRISA, the publishing group of EL PAÍS.
Before more than 200 international investors, the vice president made a closed defense of the Spanish recovery, predicting that the economy will grow 7% this year and that this figure may increase depending on the use of European funds.
Calviño explained that there are still weeks and months of difficulties.
But that forecast was made with some hypotheses that are being confirmed: there are already vaccines that bring some optimism about the second half of the year;
geopolitical tensions are easing after the US elections and the Brexit deal;
The EU is moving quickly to release aid, and the strong rebound in the economy in the third quarter despite the second wave confirms that the measures taken, mainly ICO and ERTE, have managed to avoid permanent damage.
And he anticipated that all this should allow a strong recovery in the second half.
Calviño welcomed the ERTEs averting the massive job losses of other recessions.
And he announced that it will be a permanent instrument.
Among the priorities, he cited the obligation to continue controlling the pandemic until there is enough immunized population.
He recalled the need to expedite European funds.
And he advanced to investors that important reforms, labor and pension reforms, are being prepared, the success of which will be ensured by negotiating with employers and unions.
Cos warns about the impact of the crisis on banking
The governor of the Bank of Spain, Pablo Hernández de Cos, warned this Thursday that "the deterioration of the banking sector is yet to come", since there is a lag between the blow of the crisis to families and companies and the impact on the banking sector .
During his speech at the closing of the Spain Investors Day, he valued that the bank was in a better solvency situation in this crisis than in the previous one, which has allowed that "it has not been an amplifier but a clear mitigator".
He stressed that the measures aimed at families and companies have slowed down the consequences despite the fact that the crisis has been longer than expected.
And it justified its maintenance.
He assured that the deterioration of bank profitability is due to provisions and that it will now be able to pull its capital cushion and will have "enough time" to meet the capital requirement when the pandemic passes.
