News
Collectively renovating towards a climate-neutral Antwerp
2. Dec 2022
The challenges regarding energy saving in Antwerp homes are major. As part of its Climate Plan 2030, the city aims to achieve average primary energy savings of 2.5% per year. Around 72% of the housing units in Antwerp are flats, which are often more difficult to renovate than other housing types. Focusing on collective renovation of apartment buildings will make achieving Antwerp's climate goals more realistic.
The Collective Renovation project is derived from the framework agreement ‘Climate and Environment’ with the City of Antwerp, in which the city is looking for efficiency improvements around the existing Masterplan Approach for collective renovations and ways to raise the level of ambition together with the necessary actors. The first Atelier within this project took place at the end of November, which was part of Architecture Workroom and Rebel's role as process facilitators, towards a Masterplan Approach 2.0.
The City of Antwerp supports owners of large apartment buildings for thorough renovations. The city's renovation coach assists the Association of Co-owners and syndics in drawing up a plan for renovation. The city additionally supports owners with a financial Master Plan grant. An investment grant is also being considered to support the most ambitious renovations.
In the coming years, the city intends to continue their existing approach and ensure the increase of renovation coaching capacity. However, to meet the energy-saving targets, the dynamics of the current Masterplan Approach will need to be further strengthened and accelerated. The challenge lies in enhancing ambitious (masterplan) renovations of apartment buildings. Architecture Workroom Brussels and Rebel are charting a course for 2023 towards a Masterplan approach 2.0.
This first Atelier on 28 November 2022 focused on the assumption that unravelling generic factors on the one hand and specific factors on the other within the current approach is a valuable advance towards the Masterplan Approach 2.0. A diverse group of actors took part in the Atelier, including syndics, experts from municipalities, study and consultancy firms and renovation coaches from the City of Antwerp.
After presentations from the City of Antwerp and the process facilitators, the participants dispersed at three thematic tables around factors that influence the process of the Masterplan Approach: socio-economic, spatial-physical and governance-process issues.
In 2023, several more workshops will be organised going into more specific hypotheses, such as drawing up a capacity programme with the various actors and offering a subsidy for Associations of Co-owners or a collectivity bonus.
