urbanZEB. National web platform for energy renovation

Sustainability is a multi-faceted challenge for the global society due to factors like the environmental and resource crisis and the difficulties of reducing resource consumption and greenhouse gas emissions. In order to address the challenge of improving energy usage within the built environment reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 2050, strategies must be developed with social and economic efficiency..

In recent years, Cíclica has been actively collaborating in transformative projects in the building sector at the individual, municipal, autonomic, state, and regional levels. This project has been developed within the framework of the aracoop initiative (Work Department, Social and Family Affairs of the Government of Catalonia), a program operating within the framework of public-private cooperation and promoted by the Government of Catalonia with the objective to promote social and economic cooperation.

It is a new interactive tool available to citizens, the commercial sector, administrations, and investment agents in Catalunya which aims to reach decarbonization objectives set by the European Union and Government of Catalunya by 2050.

The project is an online platform equipped with the necessary devices to provide in-depth information on the current energy status and the possibilities for energy rehabilitation for the municipality’s buildings and properties. Therefore, all of the social agents involved – citizens, the owners or tenants, promoters, investment agents, and companies in the rehabilitation sector – will be able to access the necessary information to make decisions regarding building interventions in their environment. The project also has aims to develop a methodology and the necessary tools to aid in consultations and assessments based on the communal energy transition program.

The project will also provide additional information about the potential of energy rehabilitation in a specific area, municipality, or region.

The difference between this project and Cíclica’s previous development projects is that this project has been adapted to the Business Intelligence Software once used by the new European standards, internationalizing the service with the European Union territory.

This long-term strategy of the tool will begin a rehabilitation process in the Spanish residential area that will transform more than 10 million homes built before 2001 into houses with low energy consumption and low greenhouse gas emissions. This will not only benefit owners and occupants – saving energy and improving quality of life – but it will also benefit the country with the creation of 110,000 to 130,000 jobs from 2015 to 2050 and the possibility of investing up to 10 million euros in the rehabilitation of 250,000 to 450,000 homes each year.