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HouseEurope! European Citizens' Initiative: Renovate, Don't Demolish!

To provide adequate housing, it is currently common practice to demolish older buildings and construct new ones, instead of retrofitting, re-purposing and re-using existing structures. This practice is not only bad for the environment and climate, but it also affects the cultural heritage of a city and often leads to the displacement of the former residents, damaging the social fabric.

HouseEurope! is the recently launched European Citizens' Initiative which challenges this status quo. The initiative is advocating for new EU-laws to make renovation and transformation of existing buildings the new norm, affordable, and beneficial to society. You can find a detailed description of the demands here, and you can sign the initiative here.

The Toni Piëch Foundation is supporting the campaigning of HouseEurope!. European Citizens' initiatives present the unique requirement to communicate the same messages in all major European countries, which makes it a perfect pilot project to harmonize the way we speak about the built environment and its challenges across many languages. Further, the challenge HouseEurope! is highlighting closely aligns with our findings from our other grantees, such as CORRECTIV, Bauhaus Earth, and energie-cluster.ch. We firmly believe that the transformation of the built environment must be inclusive and should not exacerbate existing inequalities in order to be successful - which is linked to preserving the existing building stock, as the initiative explains.

 

WHY THIS MATTERS

Today, buildings are often seen as investments, leading to widespread demolition and replacement due to financial speculation. Under business as usual predictions, Europe will have demolished about 2 billion square meters of existing space by 2050, equivalent to half of Germany's building stock, causing social, economic, environmental, and cultural issues.

The current system favors new construction over renovation, driven by regulations and incentives that prioritize high-end developments over community needs. This practice contributes to significant CO2 emissions, energy consumption, and waste generation in the EU. The building industry, responsible for 36% of CO2 emissions and 40% of energy consumption, must shift towards renovation and adaptation to address current material and energy shortages.

With only 25% of the European building stock renovated, and a current annual renovation rate of 1%, we need to triple the renovation rate to meet the EU's 2050 goals. This shift is crucial for the social and ecological transformation of the building sector. To do so, we must recognize the value of existing buildings and prioritize their renovation. Renovation is a great answer to ensure affordable living spaces, support small and medium-scale businesses, reduce CO2 emissions, and preserve memories and communities. So, how do we achieve a shift and make a change in reality? The EU has the power to change this by implementing the objectives of HouseEurope!

Putting sustainable building practices on the EU agenda! The Objectives:

➔ Preserving Existing Structures: Advocate for the preservation, renovation, and adaptive reuse of buildings to conserve resources, reduce CO₂ emissions, and maintain cultural and historical continuity.

➔ Implementing Economic Incentives: Propose measures like tax incentives and harmonization of standards to make renovation more attractive and economically viable than demolition.

➔ Valuing Embodied Energy: Highlight the importance of accounting for the energy already invested in buildings to shift past environmental impacts toward future sustainability.

➔ Creating Affordable Housing: Leverage the cost advantages of existing buildings to create affordable living spaces, mitigate gentrification, and prevent displacement of communities.

➔ Transforming the Construction Sector: Aim to shift the industry from material-intensive to labor-intensive, creating jobs and boosting local businesses across Europe.

➔ Aligning with EU Policies: Build on existing national and EU legislation to promote renovation and transformation and enhance sustainability – socially, economically, and ecologically.

➔ Reaching Climate Goals: Encourage renovation and transformation of existing buildings, contributing to the EU’s goal of decarbonizing the building stock by 2050.

The Toni Piëch Foundation is supporting the campaigning of the European Citizens' initiative with a grant of €20,000.