The PROBONO project (The Integrator-centric approach for realising innovative energy-efficient buildings in connected sustainable green neighbourhoods) was selected among 115 project proposals for the Horizon 2020 Framework Programme called LC-GD-4-1-2020: Building and renovating in an energy and resource-efficient way. The project officially started on the 1st of January 2022!
The ambition for sustainable and green buildings across Europe has encountered a number of barriers (e.g., high upfront construction costs, access to capital, social attitudes, lack of information, experience and incentives). To answer the challenges related to the green building market, the Horizon 2020 PROBONO project envisions a people-focused European construction industry working in harmony with the broader community of stakeholders. Here, public authorities and citizens are involved with the purpose of delivering scalable, sustainable, and viable energy positive and zero-carbon green buildings and neighbourhoods.
“The Horizon 2020 PROBONO project envisions a people-focused European construction industry working in harmony with the broader community of stakeholders.”
The project aims to provide validated solutions for the design, construction, and operation of new and/or retrofitted zero-pollution and positive energy buildings as part of sustainable green neighbourhood developments. The type of neighbourhoods will be piloted across six EU states where the PROBONO living labs will be established. #probono #Greenneighbourhoods #sustainable #zerocarbon
The living labs will be linked to business and municipality greening plans. More specifically, the six PROBONO living labs will include two municipality-driven large-scale demonstrators (Madrid and Dublin) and four living labs representing business/owner promoters of the green buildings and neighbourhoods’ transition (Porto, Brussels, Aarhus, Prague).
Achieving the goal
To achieve its goal, PROBONO will provide five transition acceleration enablers, as related to:
· strategic planning
· social engagement and innovation support
· green energy
· construction and renovation
· digitalisation for data-driven investment process and resource optimisation
Integrating those enablers and deploying them across six high-impact and people-focused real-life large-scale living labs, PROBONO will show how technological and social innovations related to green buildings and neighbourhoods can be applied.
Having a systems-based approach to the buildings’ infrastructure and a renewed focus on people and sustainability, the project will fully exploit digitalisation and smart technologies for the benefit of society. Finally, to enhance wide-scale adoption and standard creation, PROBONO will contribute with evidence-based policy recommendations, standardisation actions, and robust adoption and commercialisation strategies.
The project involved 47 partners from 15 different countries for a 5-years project duration (2021-2026). Its total budget is EUR 25.252.011, and it has received funding from the EU of EUR 20.158.449.