PAST PROJECTS

Started in April 2021, the 2-year project ‘Strengthening the security and resilience of at-risk religious sites and communities’ (S.O.A.R.) aims to advance the protection and safeguarding of European places for worship by design. The network of the partnership is extensive and includes representatives from all majority and minority faiths practicing within the EU as well as the ACE.

The ACE will be responsible to provide enhanced policy-dialogue within the EU institutions and EU member states on security by design. The concept of ‘security by design’ (SBD) incorporates security features into the design and fabric of the building. Experts in the fields of SBD such as public authority planners, architects, designers, engineers as well as faith leaders will be providing support and training in seven pilot countries: France, Germany, Belgium, Hungary, Austria, the Netherlands and Denmark. National, regional and local training in these countries will be provided and include a focus on increasing collaboration and cooperation between security offices and leaders of places of worship with their wider communities and public authorities.

One of the final results will be architectural and design best practice examples that the ACE will identify through a EU wide competition. These will be used to develop design guidelines improving security of religious sites and their associated public spaces for all congregants and visitors.

 

For more information

SOAR website | Twitter page | Facebook page

DRIVE 0 contributes to the decarbonization of the European building stock by developing a consumer-centred circular building renovation process in order to make deep building renovation more attractive for consumers and investors, environmentally friendly and cost-effective.

The project provides solutions not only for renewable technologies but also for recycling and reusing locally available resources and building materials from the existing building stock. It develops proven deep renovation products further into circular renovation products with an emphasis on easy to install plug & play prefab solutions for building envelope elements and building services. 

An ‘EU Circular Renovation Atlas’ will be developed. It will look into the design process of deep building renovation solutions in order to take into account locally bio-based materials in different processes such as re-use, re-process and recycle. The project will also develop consumer centred business models based on circular building renovation concepts supported by digitalisation and gamification. 

The result provides an attractive and understandable information of real total life-cycle performances for consumers and potential investors. The solutions produced will be fully automated BIM controlled production processes and they will be tested and validated in seven demonstration cases in Estonia, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Netherlands, Slovenia, Spain.

 

For more information

Drive 0 website | Twitter page | Facebook page | Linkedin page

 

 


BIM-SPEED developed a combination of methodologies and tools with one central information source at its core: The Building Information Model (BIM), which is the catalyst for a smarter, more efficient method of deep renovation for the residential building sector.

The mission of BIM-SPEED is to take ‘BIM for the renovation of existing residential building stock’ to a deep renovation level of at least 60% energy savings and to accelerate the BIM market uptake across the EU. BIM-SPEED aims to enable all stakeholders to adopt BIM to reduce the time of deep renovation projects by at least 30%.

The interoperability of a full range of BIM tools for renovation are accommodated on the innovative BIM-SPEED cloud platform. Throughout the 4-years, BIM-SPEED demonstrated the holistic solution in 13 real demonstration cases in eight different countries (Bulgaria, France, Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Poland, Romania, Spain) The impact of BIM-Speed actions was assessed by 13 Key Performance Indicators (KPI).

ACE is proud to have several Architectural Practices involved in the  BIM-Speed Community of Practice and participating in our annual ‘Industry Day’ webinar. The Industry day is an opportunity for all project stakeholders to learn the latest developments about the project and provide feedback for the project partners.

ACE is also jointly organising an EU-wide BIM Competition with other European umbrella organisations. ACE is glad to have Dr Olga Venetsianou and Mr Tomi Henttinen as one of the jury members in the competition.

The "EU BIM for Building Renovation Competition" competition brought together multi-disciplinary teams active in the design and construction industry to present a building renovation project that applies the Building Information Model (BIM) tools and methods developed by the BIM-SPEED partners, on their own or in conjunction with other tools available on the market. The challenge was to develop a renovation project using BIM that results in energy savings and improves the comfort of the occupants while at the same time reducing the duration and cost of the overall renovation process.The participants were divided into two categories: professionals and students.

In addition, ACE has led the development of the BIM-Speed Training Material on the tools and methodologies developed by the project. Access the training material at the link here.

Finally, ACE EB members have provided feedback on the topic of BIM and procurement processes from the architects’ Point of view.

 

For more information

BIM-SPEED website | Twitter page | Facebook page

 

&a


BIM4EEB aims to foster the renovation industry by developing an attractive and powerful BIM-based toolset with attractive solutions for building retrofitting in order to support designers in the design and planning phase, construction companies to efficiently carry out their work and service companies in maintenance. Additionally, public and private owners will be able to use the tool that eases decision-making and asset management, thanks to the exploitation of augmented reality and the use of updated digital logbooks.

This toolkit is the basic instrument for increasing semantic interoperability between software and stakeholders involved along the overall renovation process (design, planning, construction, performance assessment and management). End-users of the entire renovation process will actively participate in the development phases ensuring the full matching of project deliveries with the market expectations. Inhabitants will benefit from the increase in building performance, quality and comfort.

BIM4EEB will deliver an innovative common BIMMS (BIM management system) with linked data and a set of six tools, as follows:

· Tool 1 BIM4EEB Fast mapping toolkit

· Tool 2 BIM4EEB BIMeaser

· Tool 3 BIM4EEB BIM4occupants

· Tool 4 BIM4EEB BIMCPD

· Tool 5 BIM4EEB AUTERAS

· Tool 6 BIM4EEB BIMplanner

BIM4EEB focuses on delivering high levels of modularity between the software tools enabling their use as standalone products or services, or as part of a consolidated kit, usable for AEC end users, consulting services or by other IT businesses, if required.

Overall, BIM4EEB targets the reduction of least 20% of renovation time, 15% the average renovation cost, 10% of net primary energy use for a typical residential apartment and a reduction from 3 to 1.5 working days required for a deep energy audit.

 

For more information

Bim4EEB website | Twitter page | Linkedin page | Youtube channel

 


The Erasmus+ project on BIM in higher and vocational education. The construction industry across Europe is facing major challenges in achieving energy efficiency targets, in particular for nearly Zero Energy Buildings (nZEB), but it is also experiencing a digital revolution, with Building Information Modelling (BIM).

The project supports the construction industry, through education and training to up-skill in the area of technical innovation and digitalisation. BIMzeED develops and pilots 12 Learning Units as Open Educational Resources (OERs), and train and upskill 120 educators at European Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) and Vocational Education and Trainings (VETs). The Learning Units are common units with flexible standardised delivery (in class, on-line and on-site) suitable for HEI and VET training.

The initial training content includes nZEB related subjects with BIM maturity. The training content was developed and delivered in a Blended Learning format supported by an E-Learning portal, and the Learning Units are available as Toolkits to potential students, HEIs, VETs and SMEs.

The project team is working with various professionals (20+), SMEs, industry, product and technology providers, R&D and policy makers across Europe. By working with SMEs to tackle skills mismatches and promote excellence in skill development, BIMzeED is in line with the ‘renewed EU agenda for higher education’ (Education and Training 2020 strategy) and also ensures that SMEs are not left behind in this fast-developing industry.

Are you interested? Sign-up for BIMzeED newsletter at BIMzeED website and don’t miss our updates.

 

For more information

BIMzeED website | Twitter | Facebook | Linkedin | Youtube | Instagram

RenoZEB unlocks the nearly Zero Energy Building (nZEB) renovation market by increasing property value through a new systemic approach to retrofitting. This includes innovative components, and processes and decision-making methodologies to guide all value-chain actors in the nZEB building renovation action. RenoZEB develops cost-effective ‘plug and play’ solutions for large-scale deep nZEB renovation. The real (Estonia, Spain) and virtual (Bulgaria, Greece, Italy) demonstration cases show and ensure the replicability of the approach to different building types and climates. The technical tools will monitor the buildings before and after the nZEB renovation.

This is achieved through:

1) Innovative, holistic, cost-effective, and fast deep retrofitting methodologies for nZEB

2) ICT tools to support nZEB renovation

3) Cost-effective and non-intrusive prefabricated multi-functional modular ‘plug and play’ façade systems for the renovation of buildings

4) The transformation of buildings into Active Energy buildings in order to increase the post-retrofitting property value

5) New collaborative methodologies and decision-making process for selecting the best energy efficient renovation strategy for each building

6) New drivers of change for the Real Estate Industry creating improved post-renovated property value schemes

7) The demonstration of market replicability of the RenoZEB approach through real and virtual demonstration sites.

ACE co-organised a policy session on ‘scaling-up deep energy retrofit markets towards 2030 targets’ during the EUSEW 2019 in June in Brussels. Watch the session here.

ACE also organised a Train-the-Trainers workshop with the participation of 23 ACE members. Find the workshop recording here.

Tutorial videos about RenoZEB facade system and tools are available on RenoZEB YouTube channel and also in Udemy platform.

Two national workshops were delivered in Estonia and Spain (home of the RenoZEB Demonstration Cases). Watch the workshop recordings here.


For more information

RenoZEB website | Twitter | Facebook | Linkedin

TripleA-reno seeks to change the paradigm that buildings use energy, as in fact people use energy for their comfort at home, work, etc. The aim of this project is to activate the renovation market, which faces many barriers, but not only technological ones. For this, TripleA-reno provides occupants and building professionals with the right information and tools in order to make deep renovation attractive, acceptable and affordable, hence TripleA-reno.

The project will raise self-awareness of occupants’ behaviour, by providing gamified support tools, which help occupants to make informed and economically wise decisions regarding the renovations of their homes. The benefits of the proposed solutions are tested and demonstrated in live cases (Greece, Hungary, Italy, Netherlands, Romania, Slovenia, Spain) whereas the results are rolled-out on a wider EU scale through the TripleA-reno Road Show. The Road Show events include an interactive workshop on storytelling about decision making in residential renovation and present the gamification platform developed in the project.

In 2019 the “TripleA-reno Road Show” started with awareness raising events at CLIMA 2019 in Bucharest and at the Social Housing Festival in June in Lyon. You can watch a trailer to the Road Show here.

Due to the Covid-19 emergency, the TripleA-reno Road Show around EU couldn't happen in 2020. The project team came up with a contingency plan moving from a Road Show to a "Home Show", getting to the homes of the project partners. You can watch the Home Show episodes at this link.

ACE also organised an Energy Day on ‘Voluntary certification schemes and other integrated approaches in support of deep renovation of buildings’ during the EUSEW 2019 on June 18 in Brussels. Watch the session here .

 

For more information

TripleA-reno website | Twitter | Facebook | Linkedin | Youtube

 

 


DigiPLACE produced a feasibility study for the development of a European Industrial Digital Construction Platform in order to modernise the European Construction industry and ensure its global competitiveness in the 21st century. The project did not develop the actual platform but rather a framework for it, to be developed in a future EU tender. In order to pave the way for a strong digital network environment, DigiPLACE engaged with a large stakeholder community, of which ACE represents the architects’ point of view.

The project team set out by identifying existing digital platforms inside and outside the construction sector in order to produce a comparative analysis of the state-of-the-art. DigiPLACE also provided an impact analysis of digital technologies in the construction industry and other sectors for identification of possible points of knowledge transfer.

The project also identified the gap between industries that are used to digitalisation in their production process and the construction industry in order to set a clear definition of limitations and barriers for the construction industry to overcome. Finally, the project proposed a roadmap for the future research and public policies.

The project was supported by an Advisory Board who validated the quality of the delivered knowledge and specifications. ACE has nominated Mr Peter Hyttel Sørensen the chair of the ACE BIM WG as a candidate for the AB election.

ACE has also organised the webinar 'Are architects ready for digitalisation' in September 2020. During the webinar the DigiPLACE team presented a European state-of-the-art analysis, examining how digitalised the construction industry already is, and which are the possible points of knowledge transfer. Furthermore, experts in the field of architecture and digitalisation highlighted the necessity of architects’ involvement in the 4.0 revolution. Watch the webinar recorded session here.

 

For more information

DigiPLACE website | Twitter page | Linkedin page

 

 


ICARO worked on the redefinition of profiles and training of construction site technicians. ICARO assumed a crucial role in relation to the revitalisation of the construction industry, which needs a generational replacement, orientating young and unemployed towards qualified professions. Moreover, the project also included gender issues in the construction sector, since among vocational education graduates, only 10 % are women.

The project focused on Work Based Learning (WBL) methods and exchange and mobility experiences within companies into the training process. As a result, the project generated a beneficial impact on employability of young people, reducing unemployment at European level, promoting actions that facilitated a quality training that is attractive and relevant to the employment Market.

The objectives of ICARO were essentially three:

· revitalize the building sector by means of a profound generational turnover, steering the young and unemployed towards qualified professions;

· reverse the trend that sees few women employed in construction;

· increase employment possibilities by incorporating work-based learning in the training process of companies.

Icaro’s aimed to improve the planning of training activities that lead to the VET qualification at a European level involving students, enterprises and the system of professions. Work transition and apprenticeships must become the paradigm of training so as to introduce elements of flexibility within the curricula. In this scenario the experience of Work Base Learning plays a strategic role. The impact of the project was particularly relevant in the 3 countries taking part in the project: Lithuania, Spain and Italy.

 

For more information

ICARO website | Twitter page | Facebook page

BIMplement (September 2017-August 2020)

A follow-on project from PROF/TRAC, with the overall aim to achieve an improved quality for nZEB construction and renovation by setting-up Continuous Professional Development training and BIM-enhanced qualification schemes. These addressed the entire value chain in a cross-trades and cross-level multidisciplinary approach, strengthened with hands-on and BIM enhanced workplace learning tools. NZEB construction needed an enhanced systematic approach to the quality control of the entire process to reduce the gap between designed and actual performances of buildings. This required a fully qualified and equipped workforce, capable of implementing, executing and performing all the necessary labour actions with understanding of the responsibility of their own profession and work, as well as the relationship with the other professions and work involved. The project had two main areas of focus: air tightness and ventilation; and five participating countries: France, Spain, the Netherlands, Lithuania and Poland. ACE has organised an Energy Day in June 2019 on up­skilling the AEC industry to deliver high-quality, energy efficient retrofitted buildings with BIM learning tools. Do you want to watch it? Click here. ACE was also in charge of organising two webinars on the results of this project that took place in December 2019, and the second one in June 2020.

Follow BIMplement on social media and learn more about it!

For more information visit BIMplement website.

 Twitter  Facebook  Linkedin  Youtube


ABRACADABRA (March 2016- February 2019)

This three-year Horizon 2020  project focused on the market up-take on energy efficiency and was coordinated by the Alma Mater Studiorum University of Bologna. ABRACADABRA stands for Assistant Buildings’ addition to Retrofit, Adopt, Cure And Develop the Actual Buildings up to zeRo energy, Activating a market for deep renovation.

ABRACADABRA was based on the prior assumption that non-energy related benefits play a key role in the deep renovation of existing buildings. In particular, actions focused on the following main benefit: the generation of a substantial increase of the real estate value of the buildings through significant energy and architectural transformation (mainly integration of Renewable Energy Sources systems with new volume additions or new buildings’ construction) to go beyond the minimum energy performance and aim at achieving Nearly Zero Energy Buildings (nZEBs). 

National workshops took place every six months in Italy, Greece, Spain, Norway, Romania, the Netherlands and Latvia, and they were open to all interested stakeholders. During those meetings technical, regulatory and financial toolkits have been discussed in order to raise the renovation rate of the EU buildings stock. All positions from the national workshops were then brought forward to the bi-annual international workshops coordinated by ACE.

Website of the project: http://www.abracadabra-project.eu


PROF/TRAC H2020 Project (March 2015- February 2018)

PROF-TRAC was a three-year project partially funded by the EU Horizon 2020 program. It develops an Open Education Platform for Continuing Professional Development on nearly zero energy buildings (NZEBs). This platform addressed technical experts, architects and managers. The developed European qualification scheme was part of a life-long learning process for continuing development and up-skilling of professionals. Especially the collaboration between these professions was necessary to develop mutual understanding of each others’ disciplines and combine skills to achieve optimal nZEB construction and retrofitting in terms of performance quality, energy efficiency and cost effectiveness.

The first step was the mapping of existing skills and qualifications in the EU and to compare this with the required skills for nZEBs. Thereafter, the outcome was matched with existing qualifications, knowledge sources, education programmes, post-initial training supply and accreditation/ certification structures, and also linked to the BUILD UP skills actions. This was already done for seven pilot countries. On this basis the project developed a Train the Trainer training, which was open to CPD trainers from all around Europe.

There were 15 partners in the consortium from 8 EU countries. Two ACE member organisations (MOs) were also part of the consortium: Italy and Slovenia. Moreover EU funding and ACE made it possible that 6 other ACE MOs could send their CPD trainers to these trainings (Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, Ireland, Portugal and Spain).

ACE’s main role in the project was to lead the dissemination activities. Check the YouTube Channel of the project with videos on CPD training on NZEB 


A2PBEER – FP7 Project (September 2013 – February 2018)

A2PBEER – Projet FP - Adaptable Public Buildings Through Energy Efficient Retrofitting

A2PBEER is a 4-year research project partially financed by the 7th EU Framework Programme. The projects’ full title is “Affordable and Adaptable Public Buildings through Energy Efficient Retrofitting”. 21 partners from 11 countries around Europe form the project’s consortium. Among them are research institutes, companies from the sectors of technology, energy, building industry, as well as universities, local and national authorities.

Following the notion that boosting energy efficient buildings’ retrofitting is the only way to reach EU’s 2020 targets, A2PBEER develops a methodology for the systemic energy-efficient retrofitting of public buildings and takes advantage of synergies derived from interventions at district level. A2PBEER retrofitting solutions include already available technologies and more innovative ones developed within the project, such as “high performance envelope retrofitting”, with super-insulated façade panels and smart windows, “smart lighting systems” combining LED and natural light, and the “Smart Dual Thermal Substation”, a new approach to district heating. A “kit-concept” will be applied in the development of new solutions in order to deploy adaptable and affordable solutions.

The outcomes of the research performed are demonstrated in three real demo-cases (Sweden, Spain, Turkey) as well as in three complementary virtual projects (Norway, Italy, Croatia). The aim is to cover a variety of climatic areas and building uses.

A2PBEER has produced two free online tools for public building retrofitting, which are available on the project website: The Support Guide Toolkit assists stakeholders in making best practice decisions on how to improve the energy performance of their public building or district. The Financial tool uses a simple excel sheet which focuses on financial analysis, return on investment, cost control and evaluation of rehabilitation of public buildings.

One of the main roles of the ACE in A2PBEER is to lead the dissemination of the project’s results and participate in the development of training materials addressed to architects and other identified key training groups.

Website of the project.

YouTube Channel of the project with many training videos on public building retrofitting.


Erasmus+ (September 2014 – August 2017)

The European Association for Architectural Education (EAAE) and the Architects´ Council Europe (ACE) are partners, alongside eight European schools of architecture, in the Erasmus+ Strategic Partnership project ”Confronting Wicked Problems: Adapting Architectural Education to the New Situation in Europe”. The project received 285 000 € from the EU for a three year period and is coordinated by the Oslo School of Architecture and Design (AHO).

The project raises the question of how to teach architecture in Europe today, and especially how curriculum and teaching should be adapted to the new societal and professional situation. The project aims at strengthening the architectural graduates´ ability to face this new normal and thus improve their social impact and employability. Three subtopics were identified that will undergo investigation in so-called Think Tanks: (1) Teaching Architectural Design and Professional Knowledge (TADPK), (2) Sustainability and (3) Heritage. Based on the activities and experiences from the short term intensive programmes the think tanks will discuss pedagogical methods and structure of curriculum for teaching within the relevant fields. Join the Facebook community!

EAAE and ACE are active partners in the project, but do also serve as infrastructures for dissemination of the project results to relevant stakeholders in academia and profession. An important impact is also to establish closer bonds between ACE and EAAE through opening-up several areas of cooperation and exchanging experience, expertise and networks. 

Results of the first two years were presented at the EAAE conference in Delft in September 2016 and the reports are available on the website


INSPIRE – FP7 Project (October 2012 – September 2016)

iNSPiRE was a 4 year research project partially funded by the 7th EU Framework Programme. There were 24 partners in the project’s consortium from 8 EU countries. Among the partners were representatives of research and development institutes, industry, business and not-profit organisations.  

During the four years the project produced five different systemic renovation kits that can be applied to residential and office buildings from the outside of the building, while allowing the occupant to remain inside. Their aim is to reduce the primary energy consumption of a retrofitted building to lower than 50kWh/m²/year. The innovative nature of the kits is that they integrate different retrofit components into insulated, prefabricated building envelopes. These components include HVAC systems, lighting and shading systems, pipes and ducts, and energy generation systems. The packages are suitable to a variety of climates while ensuring optimum comfort for the building users.  

One of the main roles of the ACE in this project was to identify the non-technical barriers to the implementation of the developed packages. Moreover, the ACE participated in the dissemination of the project outcomes and co-organised a special conference on ‘A new understanding of energy-efficient renovation’ in Brussels.

ACE prepared a ‘Guidebook’, which summarises all project results including lessons learned from the demonstration projects. The guidebook is aimed at European architects, private property owners and public procurers and can be found here.

Website of the project: www.inspirefp7.eu


LEEMA – FP7 Project (January 2012 – December 2015)

Leema

This project was partially funded by the 7th EU Framework Program and developed a new generation of inorganic insulation materials and building insulation masonry components. The developed materials are suitable for applications both in new and retrofitted buildings. They have significantly lower embodied energy (by 70-90%) and a lower unit cost (by 25-30% compared to the cost of commonly used insulation materials). Moreover, they do not present any technical, health and environmental drawbacks.

One of the main roles of the ACE in this project was to evaluate the new developed products in relation to the requirements of the European architects. The ACE was also responsible for the technical coordination of the Business Plan and for the promotion of the new products in the building sector.

Website of the project: www.leema.eu


OPEN HOUSE (February 2010 – June 2013)

OPEN HOUSE

Benchmarking and mainstreaming building sustainability in the EU based on transparency and openness (open source and availability) from model to implementation.

The objective of OPEN HOUSE, a project partly financed by the 7th EU Framework Program, was to merge existing methodologies for the sustainability assessment of buildings (like LEED, BREEAM and DGNB) towards a common view. With the aim of being widely adopted in Europe, the OPEN HOUSE methodology was developed in a fully transparent, collective and open process, with extensive communication and interaction between various stakeholders. The final outcome of the research performed is a non-proprietary sustainability assessment method for buildings in design phase or operation. OPEN HOUSE offers a comprehensive and user-friendly methodology, supported by an interactive and free to use web tool (OPEN HOUSE Platform). 


SHELTER (June 2010 – May 2013)

Social Housing organisations and European professionals Linked and acting together for Testing and promoting project team in Energy Renovation. 

The Shelter project aimed to map the structure of project teams employed by Social Housing Organisations in the energy upgrading of existing housing schemes. The intention has been to identify the optimum team structure in the expectation that using the optimum team will lead to significant improvements in the final energy performance of the projects to which it is applied. This is akin to investigating models of integrated project delivery. The outcomes of SHELTER are presented in the following publications: “Recommendations for Public Authorities” and the SHELTER Guide “Innovate to Renovate” (available in EN, FR, IT, BG).

The recommendations suggest ways to improve the coordination between professionals in the energy renovation of social housing. Among others, these recommendations highlight the importance of the architects’ role in energy renovations. The Guide proposes possible alternatives for the energy renovation process for SHOs. These alternatives have been shown to overcome difficulties some Social Housing Organisations have experienced in their existing renovation processes.


TrainReBuild – IEE project (December 2010 – December 2012)

TrainRebuild

The objective of TrainRebuild project was to encourage retrofitting in a wide range of residential buildings. To successfully reach building owners, training materials presenting technical and financial aspects of residential retrofitting works, were produced. These training packages were also customised to the local conditions of 10 EU countries (BG, DE, ES, FR, GR, HU, IT, PT, RO, UK). The developed materials can be of particular use to architects as they provide valuable information on technical issues, legislation and financial instruments. This information can in fact be used to help property owners overcome any constraints or uncertainties over renovating their buildings. 

Website of the project: www.trainrebuild.eu


ENHSA III

ENHSA III Thematic Network is an extended consortium of schools of architecture, academic associations, professional bodies and cultural foundations, which collaborate in order to contribute to the foundation and the development of the European Higher Architectural Education Area. In this context, the ACE, as an institutional partner, was responsible for the organisation of a series of events in 2011 that explored the gap in expectations between the graduate architect and the experienced professionals that employ them.

To read the principal conclusions of the two events, click here


Towards Class “A”

Towards Class “A”

This project was coordinated by Energie Cités and was a follow up to the highly successful Display project that preceded it.  In the project Local and Municipal Authorities were encouraged to sign up to the Display Campaign in which the energy performance, water consumption and CO2 emissions of its buildings are measured and displayed in a prominent position within the building.  In this way the project seeks to encourage Local and Municipal Authorities to become shining examples of energy efficiency.

The ACE was a partner in this project and was principally involved in identifying exemplary buildings for inclusion in the campaign, providing a jury member for the TCA Award and in disseminating the work of the project to its Member Organisations.


Build-for-All

This project was coordinated by Info-Handicap, an organisation based in Luxembourg and consisted of the production of a guide for Local Authorities on how to prepare calls for tender for buildings that include the principles of Design-for-All in the specifications.  The objective is to encourage the incorporation of a fully inclusive approach to the design and construction of all public buildings.  The Reference Manual that the project produced was officially launched at an event in the European Parliament in Strasbourg in November 2006 that was supported by three Inter-Groups of the Parliament: the Inter-Group on Ageing, the Inter-Group on Disability and the Urban/Logement Inter-Group. As such it received full cross-party support from Parliamentarians, many of whom attended the launch.

The ACE was closely involved in all stages of this project and contributed substantially to the writing of the Reference Manual. Its President was also featured in a video that describes the necessity of adopting this inclusive approach and included descriptions of two buildings that have considered the issues. ACE also ensured a wide distribution of the Reference Manual and has continued to promote it on all appropriate occasions since the completion of the project.


ENABLE

The Coordinator of this project was the CSTB in France and it was run in the context of the European Construction Technology Platform (ECTP) initiative.  The objective of the project was to identify those countries in Europe that did not have a National Construction Technology Platform and to seek to facilitate the start of an initiative in each of those countries.  It also carried out extensive survey and research work in order to catalogue the success of national initiatives already in place across Europe.  That work was carried out by ASM, Poland and led to the production of a most informative report on the priorities or research in each country of Europe where a national initiative exists.

ACE was responsible for facilitating the creation of national initiatives in Ireland and in Turkey.  In both cases it organised local events with interested stakeholders in order to inform them of the opportunities that would be presented by the creation of a national technology platform.  In Ireland, the situation was difficult and no concrete results were achieved.  However in Turkey, the ENABLE project has encouraged the establishment of a most successful initiative known as the Turkish Construction Technology Platform (TCTP).


Back to top