ARD broadcast (2019): Maximum emission-free - residential areas without cars
Published
Maximum emission-free - residential areas without cars
Planet Knowledge from 8.4.2019. 05:01 Min.
Available until 8.4.2024
ARD-alpha
A district without cars, in a major German city? In Cologne-Nippes, about 1300 people live in a car-free neighbourhood. The residents of the French Quarter in Tübingen have been gathering experience in a neighbourhood without cars for around 20 years. Does the concept work?
Dr. Kirsten David, a researcher at HafenCity University (HCU) Hamburg, has developed an innovative method for determining rent increases after energy efficiency measures: By means of functional cost splitting, rent increases become appropriate and comprehensible. The planning of the energetic measures is also ecologically optimized. For her dissertation entitled "Functional Cost Splitting for the Determination of Rent Increases after Energy Efficiency Measures", the scientist today receives the "BUND Research Award 2020". With the research award, the Bund für Umwelt- und Naturschutz (BUND) honors scientific work on sustainable development.
Rent increases due to energy-efficient building modernisation are legally permissible and politically desired as an investment incentive. After all, according to the German Energy Agency (dena), around 35% of Germany's total energy consumption is attributable to the building sector. An increase in the renovation rate is therefore necessary from a climate policy perspective.
However, while the legislators assume that such measures can be implemented economically and without affecting the rent, the experience of many tenants is different: Often the rent increases exceed the saved heating and energy costs many times over. In extreme cases, tenants can no longer afford their apartments. "To this day, energy-efficient building refurbishment has a reputation as a gentrification tool," says David. With the method she developed to determine appropriate rent increases, the 45-year-old scientist also wants to contribute to an increased social acceptance of corresponding measures.
"The basis of the politically expected increase amounts is the so-called coupling principle," explains the architect. "Like the Energy Saving Ordinance, it assumes that energy efficiency measures will always be implemented when a comprehensive refurbishment is due anyway. The sticking point: only the modernization costs entitle landlords* to rent increases, but not the costs for the renovation. The latter must be deducted from the total investment sum as "anyway costs". Eight percent of the remaining costs can be passed on to the tenants as a modernisation charge.
"The current regulation is insufficient. In practice, there are manifold demarcation problems between modernisation costs relevant to rent increases and maintenance costs not relevant to rent increases," says David. The method she developed, on the other hand, focuses on the climate-relevant improvement of each individual building component compared to its condition before the construction measure. "Functional cost splitting thus corresponds to the actual basic idea of the legislators, is practicable and enables an appropriate and comprehensible allocation to modernisation or refurbishment costs," says David.
According to the scientist, her approach leads to the omission of measures that are nonsensical from a structural engineering point of view and do not bring about any climate-relevant improvement of the building components: "With my method, such measures are not relevant for rent increases and are therefore uneconomical for landlords. In addition, your calculation method ensures that the modernization levy actually approaches the level of the ancillary cost savings as a rule. The award winner is therefore particularly pleased that the sustainability aspect of her work has been recognised with the BUND Research Award: "Rental housing stock can only be developed sustainably if ecological, economic and social aspects are given equal consideration. Functional cost splitting makes a significant contribution to this."
This year, the BUND Research Award will be presented at a virtual conference. Among other things, keynote speaker and environmental scientist Ernst Ulrich von Weizsäcker will discuss with the three award winners how science can develop more relevance and effectiveness for sustainability goals. The transfer into practice is also an important concern for David. Her next goal is to further develop functional cost splitting into an instrument that can also be understood by laypersons - preferably as an online tool.
Personal details:
Kirsten David is a guest researcher at HCU in the subject areas "Design and Analysis of Structures" with Prof. Dr.-Ing. Annette Bögle and "Construction Economics" with Prof. Dipl.-Ing. Reinhold Johrendt as well as a lecturer in the interdisciplinary study programmes. Her doctoral thesis was supervised by Prof. Dipl.-Ing. Reinhold Johrendt and Prof. Dr.-Ing. Thomas Krüger, (subject area "Project Management and Project Development in Urban Planning") and is freely available: https://edoc.sub.uni-hamburg.de//hcu/volltexte/2019/508/.
The aim of the EnergiespeicherPLUS programme is to drive forward the expansion of photovoltaics in Berlin and to increase the share of renewable energies in electricity consumption, even in times of low sun and low wind. This benefits climate protection, as CO 2 -emissions can be avoided. The Berlin Energy and Climate Protection Programme provides subsidies for the investment costs of electricity storage systems if a photovoltaic system is installed at the same time. The
IBB Business Team GmbH implements the program. Since 1 January 2020, an electronic application for funding can now be submitted quickly and easily to the IBB Business Team GmbH under www.energiespeicherplus.de be put.
Energy Senator Ramona PopEvery Berliner can make a contribution to the energy transition in our capital city. We support this with our Energy Storage PLUS funding programme. I am pleased about the great interest. Since October, over 200 preliminary applications have already been submitted. Every new photovoltaic system helps us get one step closer to our goal of becoming climate neutral."
We subsidise the purchase and commissioning of solar energy storage systems of up to 15,000 euros. If the storage system has a forecast-based operating strategy, a bonus of 300 euros is added. The prerequisite for a subsidy is that a photovoltaic system is purchased and commissioned at the same time as the storage system. The subsidy can be combined with other funding, e.g. from the Funding programme for business-oriented electromobility or from the green roof funding programme, can be combined. All owners of buildings in Berlin can apply for the funding.
3.1.2020 | Source: Berlin Senate Department for Economic Affairs, Energy and Operations
The member states of the United Nations want to agree on a new urban agenda as part of the Habitat III conference in Quito. This "New Urban Agenda" is intended to serve as a political guideline for urban development over the next two decades. Federal Building Minister Barbara Hendricks takes part in the official opening of the Habitat III conference together with Friedrich Kitschelt, State Secretary at the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development.
Hendricks: "All over the world, people are moving to cities. Cities therefore hold the key to a sustainable and climate-friendly world. It is important to invest in the right infrastructure today. Cities need support for this. They must be put in a position to fulfil the demands of their inhabitants for decent housing, access to energy, clean water or sewage and waste disposal, but also for education and participation. This is what I will be campaigning for in Quito."
Half of the world's population already lives in cities today. By 2050, this figure is expected to rise to two thirds. Around 90 per cent of this growth is taking place in developing and emerging countries. At the same time, cities are responsible for around 70 per cent of global greenhouse gas emissions. Habitat III is a UN process that addresses the development of cities around the world against the backdrop of urbanisation and places it in the context of the global sustainability goals of the 2030 Agenda and the Paris Climate Agreement. The "New Urban Agenda", which is to be adopted in Quito, will provide governments, cities and local and regional actors with a globally applicable framework for action for the sustainable development of cities.
The Federal Government is committed to ensuring that cities are recognised as development actors in an integrated urban development policy. Only if cities and regions are strong and have a say in their urban development concerns can they offer a high quality of life for their citizens and enable democratic participation. In the negotiations at Habitat III, Germany will contribute its experience with the principle of subsidiarity, local self-government with the provision of adequate financial resources, urban development and housing promotion and the model of the compact European city.
The World Conference of Cities takes place every twenty years. Habitat III follows on thematically from the two previous conferences in Vancouver (1976) and Istanbul (1996). Around 30,000 participants from 180 countries are expected to attend the conference in Quito, including delegates from governments, academia and civil society organisations. On the third day, Federal Building Minister Hendricks will be travelling on to Costa Rica. State Secretary for Construction Gunther Ad-ler will accompany the German delegation together with State Secretary for Development Kitschelt until the end of the conference on 20 October.
Short info: "How will our cities develop? And who actually determines this - the city administration alone or also the citizens? In three European metropolises the reportage City of the Future - Future of the City looks for answers: In London we get to know the concept of the city as a profit-oriented enterprise that has to prove itself in global competition with other metropolises. In Hamburg, we follow the transformation of a problem neighbourhood as part of the IBA 2013, while the residents of a small, still original artists' quarter create their own living space. In Madrid, the problems of a constantly growing city are becoming concrete: an illegally built district has emerged just 20 kilometres from the city centre, which the residents manage independently. The area has become economically interesting for the city of Madrid in recent years. So the authorities have houses demolished - leaving families on the street. But there is resistance."
Running time: 45 min.
Year of production: 2013
Media type: DVD
Language version: de, en
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