From Silos to Systems Thinking – The Property Sector’s New Energy Landscape

The Swedish property stock is currently undergoing a comprehensive transition. New regulations, business models and technical solutions are rapidly changing the conditions of the market. For many stakeholders, the energy issue is no longer about individual buildings, but about how entire portfolios and districts can be optimised as one integrated system.

Two people already working from this perspective are Jonas Tannerstad, Head of Electricity and Automation at Örebrobostäder (Öbo), and Oliver Larsson, CEO of Energy Machines. Although they operate in different parts of the property sector, both describe the same development: a shift from isolated measures to a more integrated energy logic.

“We can no longer optimise one building at a time. Electricity, heating and ventilation are interconnected, and therefore the system must also be optimised as a whole,” says Jonas Tannerstad.

Oliver Larsson expresses the same view:

“This is not a technical transition, but a system transition. Value is created when systems are connected, not when they are built in new silos.”

When point solutions are replaced by holistic thinking

The sector’s structural challenges are clearly reflected in how the property industry has long operated. Procurement and contracts have often focused on individual measures without considering how different systems interact. This has led to solutions that may work in a single building, but do not hold up when scaled across an entire portfolio, and in some cases tie property owners to costly proprietary platforms.

At Örebrobostäder, this became clear already in the early 2000s. When the company planned to introduce individual metering, Jonas Tannerstad and his team realised that the proprietary technology available at the time lacked scalability. This became the starting point for building an open and modular system architecture, where everything from substations and ventilation to elevators can be integrated into the same logic.

“When you start from the whole, it quickly becomes clear which solutions actually help the system and which only create new obstacles. It is about building to scale, not getting locked in,” says Tannerstad.

Oliver Larsson sees the same pattern in the private sector.

“For a long time, the industry has worked in separate tracks, such as energy, property management and legal. But smart cities are about how data and energy move between those tracks,” he says.

The driving forces behind the transition

Today’s transition is driven by several strong external forces. EU regulations, increased sustainability reporting requirements and stricter climate targets mean that energy performance can no longer be seen as a purely technical issue, but as a strategic component of both financial performance and risk management. The financial market further reinforces this development. The EU Taxonomy, new risk models and banks’ requirements now influence how properties are valued, financed and developed.

“Banks and investors are now steering the development. Just a few years ago, many were afraid to take this type of risk,” says Oliver Larsson.

He believes the next major shift will come when these drivers are fully integrated into companies’ long term planning.

“2025–2026 will be decisive. That is when the energy transition moves straight into companies’ five year plans. The energy transition is no longer just a sustainability issue, it is financial.”

In this shift, Energy Machines operates across several sectors simultaneously. As a private actor with close links to academia, municipal clients and investors, Oliver Larsson sees how development increasingly takes place at the intersection of these groups.

“We essentially work in a triple helix model. We exchange ideas just as much with RISE and researchers as with funds, municipal companies and private property owners,” he says.

According to him, the need to address technology, finance and legal aspects together is part of the same transition. Previously, these areas were often treated separately, but when energy becomes a system issue, that approach no longer works.

The financial perspective also means that more property companies are choosing to bring property management in house, own their data and build open systems that provide control over the entire energy chain, from production and distribution to use and behaviour.

“When you know what is actually happening in hundreds of substations, you can invest with much greater precision. The holistic perspective is not a soft value, it is a financial control tool,” says Jonas Tannerstad.

Behaviour – the invisible energy leak

Despite extensive investments in technology, behaviour often accounts for the largest energy losses, both among tenants and within organisations.

“A single manual intervention can have enormous impact. If someone adjusts the heating curve because one person feels cold, it can affect the energy balance of an entire district,” says Oliver Larsson.

To address this, Öbo has chosen to work with visualisation rather than technical information. One concrete example is an energy bench outside one of the properties, which changes colour depending on load.

“You do not need to show numbers, it is enough to show when the load is high. This bench makes it immediately visible, and that makes a big difference,” says Jonas Tannerstad.

From closed to open systems

The next step in the transition is to avoid parallel and closed systems. Instead, open platforms are needed that can be used for multiple purposes. For both Öbo and Energy Machines, openness is not a technical detail, but a fundamental prerequisite for scalability.

Öbo’s open platform makes it possible to use the same sensors and infrastructure for everything from energy optimisation and operations to care services, for example detecting deviations in water use among elderly residents.

“With open interfaces, the same components can be used for completely different purposes. It is not sustainable to buy a separate solution for every function,” says Jonas Tannerstad.

Energy Machines works in a similar way.

“Much of building automation is still inefficient and proprietary. We develop our control systems in open code environments, more like a tech company than a traditional property company. That makes them scalable and easy to further develop,” says Oliver Larsson.

Clima Energy Nordic – where the property transition becomes concrete

This system shift is precisely what Clima Energy Nordic focuses on. On 2–4 February 2027, property owners, energy companies, technology developers, investors, academia and decision makers will gather to discuss how the industry can move from individual projects to integrated energy systems at district level.

“We need to start talking about how everything is connected. Energy systems are not only sustainable, they are also economically strong,” says Oliver Larsson.

That is also why forums like this are so important, according to Jonas Tannerstad:

“When the energy issue reaches the executive level, we need places where we can think together. That is where change happens.”

Clima Energy Nordic is the Nordic region’s new meeting place for sustainable and energy efficient buildings and facilities. With a focus on efficient energy use in heating, ventilation and cooling for indoor climate, property owners, investors, installers, suppliers, consultants, researchers and decision makers come together to drive the development towards sustainable buildings, facilities and profitable investments.

About Clima Energy Nordic