As part of the international series of “Sustainable Building Conferences”, the “sb13 munich” sustainability conference will take place from April 24 to 26, 2013. The conference will focus on trends towards establishing a sustainable development in central Europe’s construction and real estate industry. sb13 will provide a discussion platform for generating recommendations for politics, industry, and science, for initiating research collaborations, and for encouraging scientific exchange in particular among young scientists. The conference will be opened officially today, Wednesday, April 24, by Ministerial Director Günther Hoffmann from the German Federal Ministry of Transport, Building, and Urban Development (BMVBS). About 400 participants from 33 countries will meet at the “sb13 munich”.
The energy turnaround and associated challenges are key concerns of politics, industry, research, and of the construction and real estate sector. Energy efficiency and sustainability have long since become catchwords. Current challenges range from the development of energy-saving buildings to planning entire viable and green urban districts. Along with extensive discussions in the past 15 years, serious efforts were undertaken and initial successes were reached by several European countries in sustainable planning, building, management of buildings as well as in urban development. “It is now time to analyze still existing obstacles on the way towards the sustainable design of urban environment, to find new approaches to solving these problems, and to identify the opportunities resulting for the relevant actors,” says Professor Gerd Hauser, Director of the Fraunhofer Institute for Building Physics (IBP) and Ordinary Professor of Building Physics at the Technische Universität München (TUM) with an outlook on the future. The conference is organized by IBP and TUM in cooperation with Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT).
In talks, workshops, excursions, and an exhibition, participants in “sb13 munich” will have the chance to inform themselves about the influence of politics and industry on the energy turnaround, funding concepts for sustainable construction, sustainable regional and urban planning incorporating latest trends in planning and energy supply, and low-energy and energy-plus concepts for new and existing buildings.
Current topics, such as low-energy buildings, resource efficiency, and the robustness of building and civic structures, can be integrated easily in the definition, evaluation, and shaping of sustainability. “Using lifecycle assessments to evaluate sustainability is a suitable means not only for identifying and resolving any conflicts of objectives, but also for classifying certain issues in a wider context. Sustainability remains of constant relevance,” says Professor Thomas Lützkendorf from Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT). Hauser and Lützkendorf agree that the “sb13 munich” conference will contribute to steering national and international discussions and activities in the right direction.
Other topics covered by the conference will be methods for planning and evaluating sustainable buildings taking into account their life-cycles. In addition, the conference will present innovative materials and technologies for the construction sector. On April 24 and 25, the city of Munich and the BMVBS will organize special workshops for municipalities as part of the “sb13 munich”. A separate one-day conference was reserved for young scientists: The “Young Researchers Session” on April 23 at the Oskar-von-Miller-Forum and concentrated on current research activities and projects relating to sustainable building.
Topics and Trends at “sb13 munich”
Clear trends can be derived from the conference presentations and posters. One focus lies on economic issues, such as the integration of sustainability aspects in property valuation. Cost-effective solutions for low-energy buildings meet with increasing attention. It is important to consider sustainability aspects not just in the planning phase, as today, but in all processes and decisions throughout a lifecycle of a real estate. Additionally, it is needed to further develop and complement evaluation criteria and bases. The social and cultural value of historic buildings and civic structures, for instance, is increasingly discussed in the attempt to reconcile this value with the conservation of resources and protection of the environment. Work is also aimed at determining and applying various systems for evaluating these buildings’ sustainability. For other types of buildings, such as residential buildings, schools, or laboratories, evaluation criteria and systems will be presented at the conference.
About “sb13 munich”
“sb13 munich” is part of a series of sb13 regional conferences taking place in preparation for next year’s World Sustainable Building Conference to be held in Barcelona. This tradition of organizing regional conferences dates back to 1998. Since then, world and regional conferences have proved to be both fascinating and capable of producing valuable results.
The sb13 conference series and the sb14 world conference are initiated and organized by iiSBE (International Initiative for a Sustainable Built Environment), CIB (International Council for Building), FIDIC (International Federation of Consulting Engineers), and UNEP (United Nations Environment Programme). These organizations are international partners of “sb13 munich”. The organizers of the Munich conference (TUM, Fraunhofer IBP, and KIT) are supported by DBU (German Environmental Foundation) and the BMVBS (Federal Ministry of Transport, Building, and Urban Development). “sb13 munich” is organized by Professor Dr. Gerd Hauser, Director of Fraunhofer IBP and Ordinary Professor of Building Physics at TUM, Professor Dr. Thomas Lützkendorf from KIT, and Professor Dr. Natalie Eßig, University of Applied Sciences Munich, Fraunhofer IBP, and TUM Chair of Building Physics.
More information about the event and registration is available online at: www.sb13-munich.com.
Activities of the Fraunhofer Institute for Building Physics IBP concentrate on research, development, testing, demonstration, and consulting in the fields of building physics. These include noise control and sound insulation in buildings, the optimization of auditoria acoustics, and solutions for improving energy efficiency and optimizing lighting technology as well as climate control, hygiene, health protection, building material emissions, weatherproofing and protection against heat and moisture, preservation of building structures, and the conservation of historic monuments. Through holistic balancing, products, processes, and services are analyzed under ecological, social, and technical aspects in order to assess sustainability, sustainable optimization, and support of innovation processes. The research areas of building chemistry, building biology, and hygiene and work in the field of concrete technology complement the scope of activities in building physics. The IBP office at Kassel focuses on efficient energy use and the development of technical components.
Technische Universität München (TUM) is one of Europe’s top universities. It has about 500 professors, 9000 academic and non-academic staff members, and 32000 students. It focuses on engineering sciences, natural sciences, life sciences, medicine, and economic sciences. After winning numerous awards, it was selected a “University of Excellence” in 2006 and 2012 by the German Council of Science and Humanities and the German Research Foundation. In both national and international rankings, TUM is rated as one of Germany’s top universities. It is committed to the ideal of a top-level research-oriented entrepreneurial university. The university’s global presence includes a campus in Singapore as well as offices in Beijing (China), Brussels (Belgium), Cairo (Egypt), Mumbai (India), and Sao Paolo (Brazil). www.tum.de
Being “The Research University in the Helmholtz Association”, KIT creates and imparts knowledge for the society and the environment. It is the objective to make significant contributions to the global challenges in the fields of energy, mobility, and information. For this, about 10,000 employees cooperate in a broad range of disciplines in natural sciences, engineering sciences, economics, and the humanities and social sciences. KIT prepares its 22,800 students for responsible tasks in society, industry, and science by offering research-based study programs. Innovation efforts at KIT build a bridge between important scientific findings and their application for the benefit of society, economic prosperity, and the preservation of our natural basis of life. KIT is one of the German universities of excellence.