Challenge description

The building sector accounts for 40% of the global energy consumptions and contributes up to 40% of global greenhouse emissions. For this reason it is clear that energy efficiency of buildings represents a key challenge to reduce global energy use. One of the most significant issue is reducing the inefficiency of existing buildings: this would mean to reduce waste of energy sources and to avoid soil consumption.

Nowadays national policies encourage citizens to improve the energy efficiency of buildings through specific economic incentives. These fiscal advantages concern many measures such as: windows replacement, building insulation, renewable energy sources integration with traditional ones.

Carpi's urban landscape is characterized by historic buildings constructed in last centuries. From a local point of view the challenge is to integrate energy retrofit measures in existing buildings in order to improve their energy performances. Potential barriers against action could be represented by economic factors and the need to involve many stakeholders.

Challenge vision

Many people are not aware of the importance of retrofitting and sometimes they don't feel up to face the energy improvement intervention, maybe because of the lack of information about economic and management tools available.

• How is it possible to make this tools accessible to everyone?
• How can we support the administration in coordinating an organic intervention on all the buildings of our city that need to be more energy efficient, in order to facilitate citizens who want to undertake this kind of interventions?
• How can we rethink Carpi's urban network so that the retrofitting interventions on buildings may be also integrated with a better use of the spaces already available?
• Are there regenerative solutions that could improve our way of inhabiting our city from both a technical and social point of view?