Innovative technologies
Discover innovative projects from across Europe that went the extra mile and that put in place innovative technological solutions for the renovation of their affordable and social housing stock:
Sociale Energie Sprong is a renovation concept based on economies of scale to speed up the retrofit of social housing buildings, while maintaining the overall cost affordable. The pilot project in Hoeselt, Belgium, was based on the usage of industrially prefabricated external cladding and energy modules, attached externally to the buildings’ façades. This process allowed an extraordinary 9 days of renovation works onsite, allowing tenants to remain in the building throughout.
In the district, multi-ownership challenges were overcome through informative meetings and visits to best practices in the neighbourhood. The Tallinn University of Technology is developing different technologies to be used in renovations such as modular building and industrialised building systems, which have been tested on a pilot project in the district.
The Caserne de Reuilly is an urban regeneration project providing affordable housing in Paris’ city centre. It forms part of the City’s long-term vision of a sustainable city. Formerly owned by the Ministry of Defense, the Reuilly military barracks was transformed to increase the supply of social and affordable housing in Paris. Public housing company Paris Habitat, the municipality, the State and other local stakeholders delivered the renovation of the barracks, favouring circularity principles while keeping the architectural heritage and the site’s memory. In the context of a highly urbanized city, Reuilly now holds affordable and social dwellings, a student residence, a nursery, common gardens, and commercial activities. A new neighbourhood emerged out of this previously vacant area.
Propelled by beneficial fiscal conditions in Italy, Energheia is a model of self-consumption in residential buildings. Initially started with a small pilot in Pinerolo, the success has already enabled replication across Piedmont (Italy). The model includes energy efficiency measures (insulation of façades, substitution of windows, solar panels on the roof and the installation of a heat pump in the thermal room, etc.) and the creation of an energy community with the residents. The involvement of the inhabitants in the energy community is facilitated by gamifying their energy consumption and starting “competitions” where residents are encouraged to consume less than their neighbour.
In its pilot phase, the project aggregated separate district-level projects scattered across the Bottrop municipality in Germany. An overarching masterplan was the mechanism of aggregation, which aimed to reduce CO2 emissions by 50% in 2030. A wide range of stakeholders took part in delivering the masterplan, including policymakers, citizens, and counted with the interest of innovative small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), such as Technoboxx GmbH from the metal processing industry and Emschergenossenschaft, which established the world’s first hybrid power plant from sewage treatment.
Kleiburg is the last original honeycomb style apartment block in Amsterdam. A cornerstone of the Bijlmermeer district, a modernist enclave that slowly became a derelict and deprived no-go area of the Dutch capital. Given the high investment costs that a deep renovation would entail, the building owner at the time – the Rochdale social housing association – was left with no alternative but demolition. Consortium DeFlat – a team of private developers – saw an opportunity to preserve the original building structure and architectural character and promote an alternative business model. Reducing the investment costs to a minimum only allowed for the refurbishment of the main buildings structure and façades while apartments were sold unfinished at an affordable price for residents to re-design themselves. Since then, the Kleiburg has become a thriving neighbourhood and is widely recognised as the largest ‘DIY home’ project in the Netherlands.
A block of apartments suffered deep renovation works, including insulation of the façade, the installation of photovoltaic panels and the removal of asbestos. Smart energy meters were installed in each flat, so tenants could track and reduce their energy consumption. Social integration and cohesion through a dedicated accompanying scheme was also part of the project.
Wir inHAUSer project can be described as remarkable in terms of its comprehensive (award-winning) concept to minimise carbon footprint through energy use, where the innovative mobility approach assumed a pioneering role. The aim was to reduce the use of private cars to a minimum through alternative means of transportation. Another feature was the management of temporary accommodation for tenants who had to move out for one and a half years during renovation works. The relocation process was facilitated by the cooperation of the five social housing providers in Salzburg who make available their stock for temporary needs. Tenants were given a say in the planning and the renovation investment was not reflected on a rent hike. The cost of the refurbishment was funded with the national social housing system in Austria, where rents are calculated based on the cost of the refurbishment.
The ‘OPENGELA’ project set-up two neighbourhood offices in the Basque Country as One-Stop-Shops (OSS) to give advice and support to the residents of the Otxarkoaga (Bilbao) and the Txonta (Eibar) districts about green energy renovation. ‘OPENGELA’ provided an interesting financing model for the region. Born out of the premise that the income and repayment capacity levels of a great share of the population was too low to access ordinary bank loans and could only access subsidies or high-interest rate credits, the ‘MAS OPENGELA’ mechanism (a mix of public and private funds) offers loans refundable in 15 years to help those low-income households cover the full investment needed for the renovation of their homes.
ÖrebroBostäder was the first public housing provider in Sweden to include as a condition in the procurement the obligation to hire jobless inhabitants as construction workers for a limited period. In addition, the planning of the intervention aimed at fostering social cohesion in the neighbourhood.