Have you ever wondered how a R&D project arises? How is it possible, for example, to be able to apply a photocatalytic treatment in the heart of a big city like Madrid? Ensuring respect of the environment through R&D requires a detailed plan of action, which involves many different actors and implies a very interesting four-phase sequence, to allow all the pieces fit.
Let’s see the recipe for success:
1) IDEA. Also known as the phase “Eureka!”. It is referred to that moment when, due to a known environmental issue, a company / organization / administration decides to contact a technological center to find a solution. Or, on the contrary, CARTIF researchers, on their continued commitment to update the state of the art of the technologies they develop, decide to look for a company committed to the environment to work on a new challenge.
2) APPLIED RESEARCH. It is named, in petit committee, as the phase “Let’s see what we have here”. Once the environmental issue to be addressed is identified, together with the science principles in which it is based on, it is time to decide how to apply them to the areas of demand. We have to use the generated knowledge by basic research and lead to the environmental problems selected in the phase of Idea. Here the purpose is always to produce technology for the development of the environmental issues addressed in the previous stage and the possibility of having additional aid, which supports part of the funding, can also be recommendable. These grants enable companies to address this phase with more resources and multiply, consequently, the scope of their results. Spanish calls of CDTI are well suited for this aim.
3) DEMONSTRATION. Also denominated “The time to act is now“. We know the scientific principles and we have checked that, at a laboratory level, the technology developed works. Then comes the time to expand the scale and test it at a higher level. For this phase, it is again very interesting to have the possibility of support from external financing. For instance, calls for proposals for LIFE Grants are the only EU financial instrument fully dedicated to the environment. Currently, there are 10 on-going LIFE projects running in CARTIF and the topics addressed are very diverse, do you know them?.
4) COMMUNICATION. At last but not least, it is important to publish the results obtained, because of that, this stage is named “shouting to the four winds”. Environmental awareness inevitably involves knowing on what work is being performed, the rate of progress, what improvements are being made and which companies are involved on the issue. Scientific publications and patents are a good starting point for us, as a technological center, but there are also other forms, such as environmental labels and Environmental Product Declarations (EPDs) to make visible which companies have a commitment with the environment.
Let us look at a successful example:
The problem of poor urban air quality due to environmental pollution by nitrogen oxides is an important environmental threat for the cities. Being able to reduce this issue is presented as a great challenge (phase: Eureka!). CARTIF participated in FENIX project few years ago, working actively, among other tasks, in the study, identification and selection of photocatalytic nanomaterials (phase: let’s see what we have here). Based on the good results achieved, some of the partners involved in this action decided to keep working and contacted the City of Madrid to increase the scale of the research and to ask for applying the developed treatment in the streets of the city centre (phase: the time to act is now). After that, LIFE EQUINOX, a R&D project began, coordinated by CARTIF, in October 2013, and it is still in progress (phase: shouting to the four winds).
Let us not forget, therefore, that it will always be better not to put the cart before the horse.
“Cities are no more than ecosystems that consume resources and transform them to produce outputs as services, goods or waste” says Richard Rogers in his book “Cities for a Small Planet”. Certainly, sustainability of these complex ecosystems depends on our capability to reduce the non-renewable sources consumption, waste production or the various means of contamination (atmospheric, light or acoustic), as well as on establishing circular strategies that allow generating new resources based on the produced wastes.
On the other hand, the technology development (that happens mostly in cities) provokes that we have an increasingly important new resource, which is the information through data, generated by citizens and the systems they use. Perhaps this source was not considered in the Rogers’ ecosystem (or at least not as important as it is now) which he said that should be circular and therefore reduce its dependency on external sources and the production of wastes as output. But there is no doubt on that, under this new industrial revolution that we are witnessing, “data is the new oil” (as David Buckingham, President at AIMIA Shopper Insights, says), whose refinement, exploitation and transformation into services allows improving the citizens’ quality of life.
Coming back to Rogers’ text, in the prologue to the Spanish version, who was the Mayor of Barcelona between 1982 and 1997, Pasqual Maragall, wrote that “my city is imposed as an indisputable evidence, the environment of everything, or almost everything that happens to me, the greatest place among all I can modify, about which I can really influence, physically, and not only through the fiction of the vote”.
It is difficult to establish an accepted definition of what a Smart City is, and even more agreeing how to measure it, but it is indubitable that the basis of the city of the future has its ground on these three ingredients that Rogers, Buckingham and Maragall state, where if we mix them we find out that in the challenge of transforming the city –understanding that every action will have an impact on its performance–, we need to work on improving the efficiency of its ecosystem –making it more sustainable–, and integrating this important source which is data to provide to citizens new and improved services to turn their day-to-daymore efficient as well. At the end, a city can’t be smart if we are not making a smart use of it and its resources.
Furthermore, undeniably, the Smart concept is trendy, and it is not only the city understanding that new mechanisms should be implemented to improve this ecosystem, but among the citizens, there is an increasing demand and use of smart technology solutions. Now, the challenge is on finding the balance among these two axes, which should converge on transforming the urban environment into a smarter and more sustainable place to live and work by agreeing those that plan it and those that are already making a smart use of sources and services.
Many of these concepts have been evident in the Smart City Expo and World Congress in Barcelona, which has been again postulated as main fora among cities, industry and citizens in this year’s edition, where all these stakeholders have gathered to learn under a Congress that this year was entitled “Cities for Citizens” which could not better summarise the ideas that this post try to share.
This was a “must” event for our Smart City projects, where we have been able to share the urban regeneration processes that we are implementing in the 16 cities in which our projects R2CITIES, CITyFiED, REMOURBAN and mySMARTLife are working, through actions in the convergence area of energy efficiency, smart and sustainable mobility and ICTs that we are implementing.
In the European Commission, there is a clear interest in improving the energy and environmental conditions of the building sector, and to reduce the impact of this sector in terms of energy consumption and CO2 emissions. That interest is materialized in funding several research and demonstration projects that go in this direction. One of these projects is iNSPiRe.
Last month it was held in Brussels the final meeting of iNSPiRe, bittersweet moment, because on one hand we were assuming the farewell of many colleagues of the 24 partners involved in the project and on the other hand meant a great satisfaction because finally, after 4 years of hard work, we were collecting the results coming from many conferences, many meetings and countless reports.
The iNSPiRe project is aligned with the ambitious European directive on energy performance in buildings which aims to achieve the reduction of energy consumption in buildings both in the residential sector and the tertiary sector. In this demonstrative project in addition to defining a process of renovation of buildings to reduce their energy consumption, they have been also developed highly efficient and innovative technological kits, with the aim of putting them on the market as future upgrades to the systems currently used in buildings renovation projects of the construction industry. In this way the building demo-sites have acted as the best testing bench for these kits. Different kits have been developed as a solution for multiple systems as kits for energy distribution or kits for envelopes and facades with innovative solutions for energy storage and energy generation systems.
As mentioned, all technological solutions developed within the iNSPiRe project have been installed on two demonstrators. One of them is located in Madrid, Spain, and the other in the German city of Ludwigsburg and both buildings belong to the residential sector. Both the data obtained from monitored buildings and the simulation data will be used for the creation of a common database that will serve professionals in engineering and architecture, as well as local authorities to inform them of the most efficient and cost-effective resources in a deep renovation of buildings.
Within CARTIF in this project we have been responsible for the tasks of monitoring, follow-up and analysis of the indicators that allow the verification of the optimum performance of the installed solutions and verify that the tenants reach comfort conditions. The first objective covered was the definition and design of a monitoring system that would allow the assessment of energy savings and to know the performance of the buildings before and after the renovation and rehabilitation process. In addition, CARTIF developed a surveillance software that show us when one of the solutions is not working properly, a situation the software interprets through the information collected from multiple sensors installed in the demo-sites. CARTIF’s work has always been closely linked to the business partners developers of technology kits one, as our role has also been to inform them of the correct performance and efficiency of their developments.
To carry out the evaluation of energy savings, both demo-sites have been monitored for two years in two periods, one year before refurbishment and one year afterwards, with the aim of identifying their behavior before and after and obtain a base line for comparison. For this task four groups of indicators were defined: comfort, electrical consumption, heating demand and finally emissions. Apart from those, economic indicators have been also defined but due to the timings on the kits installation, this indicator has not been already studied.
Regarding the results, although we have not been able to make a savings analysis, we have made a comparative study of the performance of the buildings in the two monitoring periods. Once the data from all kits are available it will be possible to make more in-depth valuations.
In the Energy Area of CARTIF we are committed to help transforming our living environments into more sustainable and energy efficient ones, and our work and outcomes of the iNSPiRe project will impact in this direction.
The Taoist philosophy defines through the Ying and Yang duality, that has everything that exists in the universe, so that there are always two antagonistic and complementary forces that need each other. You can hardly appreciate the value of the Peace without the existence of wars or health if there were no diseases.
This dual approach is also applicable to technology, imposing conditions that often are opposite, but allow the balance of systems. According to the Thermodynamics, for the production of cold (heat extraction to a source of lower temperature) has to provide external power and dissipate heat to a medium that is hotter than the area you want to cool, so that the heat and cold coexist like the Ying and Yang were addressed.
The conditions of habitability that living beings we have, they require us to maintain a suitable temperature to carry out life processes, in such a way that values at 23 ° C environment, they allow us to be comfortable. However the weather and outdoor conditions present values sometimes far removed from this optimum: from – 40 ° C, which can be in areas close to the Poles, up to 55 ° C which can be summer in areas close to the Equator being essentially the presence or absence of solar radiation which causes these differences.
Technology has developed systems for the transformation of solar energy into heat or electricity, making it applicable to both heating and cooling. The absence of solar radiation produces the need for heating, and therefore it seems unlikely that we can take advantage of the available radiation that will generally be small for heating. However, the need to cold will be generally associated with the presence of sunlight, as if they were also of the Ying and Yang. In fact the air conditioning is one of them technologies star for the World Football Championship of Qatar in which is going to use fields of soccer refrigerated through energy solar (“Wolfgang Kessling: “How to air-condition outdoor spaces”).
The solar cooling offers a set of technologies in which the solar radiation is used to produce coldwater with sorbents systems (absorption or adsorption machines) previously heated with solar panels or from electricity produced with photovoltaic solar energy to power a system based on compressor. As if they were the brothers of “Rich man, poor man”, their temporal evolution has been and is different.
Until makes some 10 years, were the systems of cold solar based in machines sorbent which had of a greater number of applications and developments technological. In those days the photovoltaic face was expensive. However, with the reduction of the cost that has suffered recently this last, the use of photovoltaic to produce cold solar is increasing of way important. On the other hand, there are manufacturers of machines of absorption with systems of triple effect and yields of the 180% willing to present a hard battle for the air conditioning with radiation solar.
In any case regardless of the technology that is winner, I have clear is that, the future of the cold is hot, as hot as the Sun.
‘Or from how to cultivate the energy consciousness of the tomorrow’s citizens through the education of today’s children’
Working in a technological centre where is made R & D & i is far from being the case of living in a futuristic bubble far away from the reality that is lived at grassroots level. On the contrary what we have in our handsday by day are challenges that any of us could meet. In my case, as a researcher working on issues of energy efficiency and sustainability, that is more than evident.
As you may have already seen in previous posts of my colleagues if you’re a regular reader of this blog, in the energy area we work on numerous projects that address energy efficiency in different fields and at different scales. We approach the problem from building level to city level, going through community and district or neighbourhood scales. These projects have a multitude of more or less complex technical implications that we analyse from different perspectives and profiles (architecture, engineering, computer science or telecommunications among others) seeking the optimal solutionsforeach case, but as would Ende, that is another story and shall be told another time.
Today I want to focus my attention on a necessary pillar to achieve efficiency and sustainability that is not a technical one: the user, the neighbour, the citizen. In short, people. You and me that after all are the ones who make things work as they do. As we have seen through the results of the DIRECTION project, in which they were built two buildings of very low energy consumption in Valladolid and Munich, the behaviour of users of buildings and their awareness have a great influence on the consumption and comfort final values.
Although there is an increasingly widespread awareness on energy and sustainability, in many cases it remains somewhat generic and fails to lead to changes in our habits. As my colleague Ana Quijano commented in his post, a key element is to ensure that the actions at a certain scale are profitable. This is certainly true in general terms, but in day to day life something more is needed. Social acceptance is an aspect that affects more than we might think. It is necessary that each of us become aware of our effect of our ability to act when it comes to getting energy savings and of our responsibility. For this to be so, it is necessary knowledge, mainly about the possibilities each one can have, and of course education. At this point it is when it starts to make sense the title of this post.
If the awareness of each of us as today’s individuals is essential, educating those who will be tomorrow’s citizens it is crucial. Only in this way it will be possible to find a way out of the energy and environmental crossroad where we have placed our planet. For those like me who have already reached a certain age, to act accordingly to energy consciousness might require changes in our traditional habits, and that’s not always easy to assimilate. It would have been simpler if we had them assimilated from childhood as normal, and this is where we can influence to improve the future from the present, through the education of children. The importance of teaching children in energy efficiency and energy and natural resources saving, lies not only in the transmission of adequate personal and social values, but in that they can assimilate as their own some behaviours that most adults have had to acquire belatedly, if we have done it.
There are increasingly more initiatives in this line in which the smallest of the house are the focus of attention. In schools, camps and other activities are routinely included resources relating to recycling and the reduction of the use of natural resources and their efficient use. How the energy is produced, transformed and used, as well as the consequences of each step are already part of the curricular itinerary. Recently, our colleague Laura López was speaking us in her post about an event organized by CARTIF in collaboration with the Municipality of Valladolid with the aim of raising awareness to children about recycling, specifically about the plastic named expanded polystyrene (EPS). Such initiatives are very important in strengthening on the education of children their awareness and responsibility. However, as a mother, I cannot fail to recognize that in this matter (as in many others) education at home is essential even more through the example. Our children reflect on their habits what they see in us, what they live every day, so we must strive to also (and especially) at home act with environmental and energy consciousness.
To achieve energy savings we can basically act in two ways, through solutions to reduce demand or consumption, or through energy efficiency solutions. Or to put it another way, spending less and spending better. It is no longer difficult to reduce the amount of energy we use by choosing devices and services of low or lower consumption and avoiding the waste of energy (holding lighted only the necessary lights, completely turning off electronic devices in the home, adjusting thermostats to suitable temperatures …).
Although it can seem difficult to see, children can also help us in these tasks. What might be more complex for us is to convince ourselves that such actions should not be a sort of imposition of our times but rather that saving energy is beneficial to us, both as individuals and as a society. Beyond the potential economic savings, reducing the general pollution with its consequent health benefits and reducing emissions of greenhouse gases that helps reducing the effects of climate change are positive consequences for all derived from individual appropriate attitudes and behaviour.
Among all and for the common good, we must help our children to take responsibility and behave in a critical way and have energy and environmental consciousness, to make it real that they are the kind of citizen of the future “our” planet needs. Particularly as a researcher in energy efficiency and sustainability, as a citizen who aspires to be part of a conscious and committed to energy efficiency and environmental protection society, and as a mother of a little citizen, I hope so.
More than 40% of the residential buildings in Europe are older than 50 years and subsequently they have a large potential for energy savings. The European Commission is aware of the need of a renovation work as well as the benefits that this activity can bring to the economy; hence, it designs strategies that help to reduce energy consumption and CO2 emissions to the atmosphere while being able to create new jobs. It is not easy to report an exact number of the benefit associated to this type of initiative given the estimations differ among reports. As reference, here it is provided the annual jobs quantified in the Strategy for Energy Retrofitting Building Sector in Spain that estimated the creation of around 97,000 and 141,000 new jobs between 2014 and 2020.
However, despite the great advantages of this sector, the beginning of a energy efficient solutions project is not simple because of non-technological barriers (Table: BPIE 2011: Europe’s building under the microscope). This explains why annual energy efficient solutions rate is around 1% in most European countries. The high investment cost and the access to finance due to a lack of long term credit from banks are undoubtedly one of the most important barriers which are related to a lack of knowledge and risk perception towards this type of action. Also, many of people who live in this type of households have limited resources and cannot afford such expensive renovations.
On the other hand, accompanying these economic barriers, there is often a lack of interest towards this investment option since the reduction of energy bills and the impact on the property value as a result of the energy efficiency measures are not very relevant aspects to involve the building owners. Nor a better thermal comfort helps to the making decision process when the payback is not imminent. Concerning the legal framework, it should be mentioned that despite the development of regulations that favor energy efficiency in buildings, there are many obstacles in this field to overcome since nowadays the regulatory framework is dispersed and is managed by several administration.
In the case of Spain, the situation is nowadays complicated after the crisis experienced in the construction sector with a special reluctance of banks to lend loans to construction companies. On the other hand, financial institutions force to housing owners to endorse their dwelling in order to solve the possible non-payment that may arise within the community of neighbors. Therefore the rehabilitation of a building or district depends in many cases on the economic capacity for companies to invest as well as the public funding. Also, it has to be mentioned that the regulation is against renewable energy and the self-consumption which is also restrained the advance of energy renovation of districts.
Given this scenario, the only way for the renovation of the buildings is to achieve a short-term payback, being currently this one of the biggest challenges since it is needed to identify the most suitable business model and financial scheme for each type of property, housing and society. Furthermore, it is required to boost the benefits of these initiatives through information campaigns.
