The construction sector creates 40% of the global CO2 emission and in order to stop climate change we need reduces this figure quickly – CARE 2050 offers, based on successful lighthouse project, the process and know-how to deliver energy-efficient buildings for both new-built and refurbishment.
When you act alone you might go faster. When you act together you come further.
CARE 2050 aims to combine both these statements:
You can go faster and come further if you improve how you can act together!
Enabling energy- and resource efficient ways of (re)constructing and using the buildings is an interdisciplinary collaborative challenge for all people and organisations involved. By supporting CARE 2050, Horizon 2020 decides to use more conscious interrelated decision making to create significant novel impact for a low carbon, climate resilient built environment. With its 3 pilot locations and market consultation, the CARE 2050 project will create 3 key deliverables:
1. The CARE 2050-Methodology
CARE 2050 introduces a new methodology for multi stakeholder collaboration to reduce the CO2-footprint of buildings and districts. CARE 2050 creates an open federal system that allows any solution-provider to join and contribute with his own state-of-the-art product, service or knowledge to (re)construct and use buildings more energy and resources efficiently by using the right, connected data. This allows fast scaling because any organisation can connect to the system with its own compliant products and then become an ambassador in their network. Governments, businesses and citizens are often not aware of how their decisions affect other stakeholders and how they can work effectively together to improve building performance. For example: a net zero energy building will not deliver the expected performance if the user does not know how to heat and ventilate the building. Better data and visualisation of comprehensive impact-scenarios will foster decision making about (re)developments in a totally new way and improve conscious use of buildings. What makes the difference is that stand-alone innovations in CO2-reducing construction methods and building performance modelling can be better connected to each other, so that collectively they will have more impact than the sum of their parts. With developing this interoperability is how CARE 2050 is going beyond state-of-the-art this is our first key-deliverable.
2. The CARE 2050-Bookshelf
The foundation for this is provided by the state-of-the-art products and know how that each consortium partner in CARE 2050 brings to the table in the fields of:
- Energy-use and smart-grid optimization,
- CO2 reduced manufacturing and (re)use of building materials,
- Building process optimization or creating interoperable digital infrastructure and tools.
Each individual innovative product or process contributes in its own way to either the energy transition or to reducing the carbon footprint of how we built. The cumulative effect is created with better information sharing between these individual solutions. A simple example: imagine the impact on traffic flows and related pollution and emissions when there will be less need to collect the information on the spot for any maintenance, construction or retrofit to be done. Therefore, existing products and processes need to be improved and get digitized so that their metrics and data can be exchanged with other processes.
3.The CARE 2050-Architecture
A big burden is the current use of information about a building on many different levels of detail, information quality and the use of many different identifiers. In the fragmented construction-, real estate- and energy- industry chain, this makes it difficult to interconnect data sources and devices in the right way. A lot of information gets lost or outdated during the lifecycle of a building. By improving this information interoperability building and renovating products and processes can become significantly more effective to contribute to the targets for the European Green Deal. The CARE 2050-Architecture enables an enhanced federal use of products and processes. Compatibility with CARE 2050 ensures easy scalability, so that each product or process can be effective either as a stand-alone solution or in a customised configuration with other CARE 2050 products. This makes it possible to choose an appropriate interoperable solution and have more impact for virtually any other new build or retrofit situation anywhere in Europe.