Cologne funding programme "GREEN to the power of 3 Roofs | Facades | Courtyards

Published 16 November 2018

With the "GREEN high 3 Roofs | Facades | Courtyards" funding programme for existing buildings, we want to expand the greening of roofs, facades and backyards. In this way, we are supporting the efforts of the people of Cologne to green and thus enhance the value of private house and courtyard areas close to their homes as well as commercial areas.

The grants are awarded as part of the GRÜN hoch 3 programme in accordance with the funding guidelines. By funding green roofs, façades and courtyards in densely populated urban areas, we are helping to improve the local urban climate.

The summer heat load is reduced, dust binding is improved and evaporative cooling is increased. The decentralised temporary storage of rainwater on roofs and in unsealed, green courtyards contributes to the retention of rainwater on site, increases evaporative cooling and reduces the damage caused by heavy rainfall events.

In areas with high levels of pollution, the unsealing and greening of unused rear courtyards and the greening of facades and roofs can not only use rainwater for evaporative cooling during summer heat events, but also achieve additional environmental improvements and building optimisation.

Info:
www.stadt-koeln.de/artikel/67044/index.html

Keywords: Stakeholders, Greening / climate adaptation, DE-News, Funding, Communities, Cologne, News Blog NRW, Environmental policy, Wildlife/animal friendly construction, Ecology, Economics

Published 28 October 2019

DAI Berlin Declaration on Housing Policy

24 October 2019

Strengthen energy refurbishment of buildings and demand responsibility from landlords.

Housing policy must create supportive framework conditions and thus contribute to the reduction of living space.

"For a necessary energy turnaround in the housing industry, conditions must be created that demonstrate noticeable incentives for owners and users to consume less energy in the future," says DAI President Dipl.-Ing. Architekt Arnold Ernst. On the occasion of the Federation Day of the German Associations of Architects and Engineers (DAI), a declaration on current topics of building and planning culture is published in annual succession. For previous DAI statements, see below.

In Germany, CO2 emissions from buildings are equivalent to the pollution caused by traffic. The intensity of the public discussion does not reflect this. This is all the more reason why architects and engineers are called upon to show responsibility in their field and to demonstrate ways in which they intend to make their contribution to sustainable climate protection.

The technical solutions are available, and we need to develop better methods, especially for the sustainable retrofitting of existing buildings. However, there is a lack of incentives for owners and users to implement and tolerate energy-efficient refurbishment. It is easier to demand climate protection than to pay for it. The environmental impact of CO2 emissions is (still) free, but avoiding it costs money, a lot of money in existing buildings. The landlord shies away from the investment because only a small part can be passed on to the rents. The tenant has an understandable insistence on not changing the size and location of his flat, especially as long as the parties keep deciding on new socially undifferentiated benefits in the competition for the cheapest rents. Both landlords and tenants must make their economic contribution in order to finance the comprehensive energy-efficient refurbishment of the housing stock.

The benchmark for all participants must be the Polluter pays principle be. Those who contribute to the release of CO2 must have an economic advantage if they actively participate in the reduction; those who refuse to participate must have an economic disadvantage as a result.

The DAI demands:

A CO2 levy for each sqm of heated floor space according to the information in the energy performance certificate from level B. This levy is covered by the Owner to pay.
A CO2 levy on the energy used according to consumption and specific CO2 emissions. This levy is determined by the Tenant to pay.

Both levies make it more expensive to live in buildings that are not optimised in terms of energy efficiency. Weighing up the direct financial burden on those affected and the long-term burden of climate change, the DAI considers the additional costs incurred to be justified. Support for economically weak households in line with the social market economy must ensure that the entitlement to adequate housing is met.

As appropriate in the sense of social indigence 30 sqm per person + 20 sqm for each additional person in a dwelling are considered. Appropriate transitional periods should on the one hand avoid social hardship and on the other hand continuously stimulate stronger incentives for the adaptation of housing conditions to economic performance. In order to also stimulate the corresponding adjustment processes above the level of social need, the regulation of the rent level should be waived, but in the case of existing tenancies with an appropriate limitation of the annual increase, also in order to facilitate the adjustment to economic performance.

DAI Presidium

Note sdg21: the statement presented here does not reflect the opinion of the sdg21 editorial team.

Keywords:
Stock, DE-News, Renewable, Climate protection, Affordable housing, Housing, Housing policy, Thermal insulation, Ecology

Published 18 December 2020

Hafner" district in Constance to become climate-neutral and energy-efficient

Constance receives project funding for "Hafner KliEn" from the Federal Government's 7th Energy Research Programme

The city of Constance strives for sustainable urban development. In the area of energy policy decisions and climate protection, this should include consideration of the triad of sufficiency, efficiency and substitution. This also and above all applies to the new Hafner district, which, in addition to 15 hectares of commercial land, also includes around 45 hectares of residential land.
Here, it is the city's declared goal to develop a climate-neutral neighbourhood in the overall balance. Early on in the process, relevant foundations were laid at the planning level and in the processes in order to think about this goal in an integrated way with all relevant subject areas and to develop corresponding concepts.

The research project "Hafner KliEn" aims to develop transferable concepts and practical solutions. The project title "KliEn" is composed of the goal "Hafner, climate-neutral and energy-efficient". For the first time in Germany, the feasibility of achieving these goals is being demonstrated in a neighbourhood of this size. An integral conceptual approach is to be developed that considers the entire life cycle of buildings, infrastructure and operating phase in a total system context. With a detailed project description, the City of Constance - supported by the Steinbeis Innovation Centre from Stuttgart - together with other partners from science and practice applied in January 2020 for funding within the framework of the 7th Energy Research Programme of the German Federal Government. At the end of November, the funding for the entire research network was approved for a total of two million euros. "We are very pleased about the recognition for the most sustainable and largest neighbourhood in Constance. The funding of 2 million enables us to tackle this ambitious goal with numerous partners. We are creating affordable housing for about 6,000 people in ecologically and energetically exemplary construction. The goal of climate neutrality is forward-looking. Especially against the backdrop of urban change, this project is of utmost importance for the housing action programme," says Karl Langensteiner-Schönborn, Mayor of the City of Hamburg, about the commitment.

In addition to the city administration, the following partners are involved in the project: The Steinbeis Innovation Centre, Stadtwerke Konstanz, HTWG and the University of Konstanz. The project partners are also pleased about the funding commitment. Dr. Norbert Reuter, Managing Director of Stadtwerke Konstanz, is one of them: "The funding enables us to develop a largely climate-neutral neighbourhood for the largest settlement expansion area in the city of Konstanz. We are very pleased to be able to help shape this path for the important areas of energy and heat supply as well as mobility." Further information on the Hafner and the "Hafner KliEn" research project at www.neuer-stadtteil.de

Source: PM of the City of Constance from 1.12.2020

Keywords:
CO2-neutral, Funding, Communities, News Blog Baden-Württemberg, Quarters

Published 15 May 2012

Messages in 2012

12/2012: NABU Negative Award goes to Ilse Aigner
www.nabu.de/aktionenundprojekte/dinodesjahres

11/2012: Europe's tallest cross laminated timber skyscrapers with nine floors currently in Milan
www.proholz.at/...mailand...

Research project "PlusEnergyQuartier Oberursel" with about 150 apartments and commercial use starts
www.fr-online.de/...oberursel

10/2012: Built Environment release "Co-Housing in the Making“
The current issue of the English-language journal "Built Environment" deals with communal living on an international level. Authors from Finland, Sweden, Great Britain, Germany, the United States and the Netherlands deal with different aspects of communal living or "co-housing".
Issue reference: www.alexandrinepress.co.uk

10/2012: The most sustainable cities and municipalities of the German Sustainability Award 2012
www.difu.de/...deutscher-nachhaltigkeitspreis-2012...

10/2012: Solar cell record with 44% efficiency
www.solarserver.com/...world-record-solar-cell...

9/2012: IBA Hamburg's BIQ - Microalgae Building
The innovative project in Hamburg Wilhelmsburg is the first house in the world to supply itself with energy via a building façade made of photovoltaic collectors. The flexible interior design also sets standards for the urban life of the future
www.biq-wilhelmsburg.de

8/2012: Climate protection in municipalities: practical guide
The practical guide was funded by the Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety (BMU) and developed by the German Institute of Urban Affairs (Difu) in cooperation with the Institute for Energy and Environmental Research (ifeu) and Climate Alliance. Difu was responsible for project management and leadership.
The guide, which was already published in 1997, was fundamentally revised in terms of content and structure due to the lively demand from municipalities throughout the Federal Republic and supplemented with current focal points and fields of action. The new guide once again contains numerous current practical examples that are intended to motivate local authorities to emulate or undertake their own climate protection activities.
www.leitfaden.kommunaler-klimaschutz.de

7/2012: On the website www.informationsdienst-holz.de information about planning and building with wood will be available again.

7/2012: Research team from Freiburg introduces natural hard foams from bark extract here:
www.pr.uni-freiburg.de/...

6/2012: Flagship project "Hamburg Water Cycle"In 770 residential units for approx. 2,000 inhabitants, toilet wastewater (black water) and other domestic wastewater (grey water) is discharged separately. The black water is collected in concentrated form via vacuum toilets with negative pressure technology and converted into biogas together with organic waste in a biogas plant:
www.hamburgwatercycle.de/...jenfelder-au

Past the need: 50,000 square meters of unletable office space in Hamburg's HafenCity
www.spiegel.de/...hamburgs-hafencity

5/2012: 20,000 MW output from German solar plants for the first time
www.iwrpressedienst.de/...

4/2012: Subsidy programmes for energy-efficient construction and refurbishment in full. The Budget Committee of the German Bundestag has released the full amount of funds for the CO2 Building Rehabilitation Programmes for 2012. This means that EUR 1.5 billion per year will be available for the KfW programmes from 2012 to 2014:
www.eco-info.de/...

3/2012: Leitfaden Nachhaltigkeitsorientierte Architekturwettbewerbe. Published by: Free Hanseatic City of Hamburg 2011
www.hamburg.de/lena

2/2012: Damien Hirst invests in 500 eco-homes in southern England
This was reported by various newspapers. According to the report, the houses will be equipped with wind turbines on the roofs, solar panels and state-of-the-art insulation technology. Hirst hopes that the settlement will become a model for sustainable living and a sustainable development of the region. In Devon, the 46-year-old artist already runs a restaurant, a studio and owns several properties. The estate's architect comes pen-led by Mike Rundell of London-based MRJ Rundell + Associates, Architects and Designers. Construction work on the 32-hectare site near Killacleave is due to start in 2013.

2/2012: Reference book "50 Solar Housing Estates in North Rhine-Westphalia". Published
www.energieagentur.nrw.de/solarsiedlungen/page.asp?InfoID=11022

1/2012: Largest Swiss timber construction in Minergie-P Eco construction, car-free living concept and multi-generation living in Oberwinterthur under construction
www.giesserei-gesewo.ch

1/2012: German construction booming in 2011 - 2012 no longer
The construction industry expects sales to grow by 1.0 percent in real terms in 2012. Following a boom year in 2011, the main construction industry association is now preparing its members for a difficult year in an uncertain overall economic environment.
www.heute.de/...

Keywords:
DE-News