Resource scarcity and the energy crisis are challenging the real estate industry to reuse existing building materials and repurpose existing buildings. The newly founded Association for Building on Existing Structures (BiB) e.V. is committed to better leveraging existing properties as the biggest lever for climate goals. The founding members of BiB combine their expertise and advocate for a common, comprehensive, and lifecycle-based understanding of building on existing structures. This is to ensure decisive progress and market standards for existing buildings that are necessary for achieving climate goals and sustainability strategy in Germany.
To achieve its goals, the association aims to engage all participants in the value chain, from crafts businesses to real estate companies and financiers, in exchange and set new standards from planning and execution to financing, in close cooperation with politics. “The first step for us is to bring all industry participants to the table and develop market standards. The DIN 276, for example, is a typical standard that was developed for new constructions. It is currently not well adaptable for existing structures. There are numerous other examples,” says the first chair, Sarah Dungs, CEO of the Greyfield Group.
That existing real estate deserves a second chance and can fully unleash its potential in reuse or conversion requires mainly education. With expertise in the construction sector, BiB offers knowledge transfer and aims to ensure targeted training and further education of skilled workers. “We want to bundle the industry’s knowledge and form a platform,” says Dungs. The training and further education offers are to be designed practically: challenges from construction practice should be discussed in a solution-oriented way to then develop recommendations for the industry. New standards are also to be set in the association’s work, for example, through hackathons.
The stock is the face of our cities and crucial for climate goals. “The challenges are diverse, and with our actions, we bear responsibility for ourselves and the future. We must accept and drive forward the transformation towards conversion of existing buildings to co-create the future in a value-added way,” demands Sarah Dungs. The existing real estate also has crucial importance for urban development: “The identity of a city evolves over centuries. If we continue as before, we not only lose the spirit of our cities but also our planet! The existing stock is the big lever, and building new is a luxury – and that’s how we should also handle it, sparingly,” adds Diana Anastasija Radke, second chair and Managing Partner, KVL Bauconsult GmbH.
The newly founded network is supported by the following founding members:
Georg Bremer, Authorized Officer, KVL Bauconsult GmbH
Sarah Dungs, CEO, Greyfield Group
Nicola Halder-Haß, Managing Partner, Bricks&Beyond GmbH
Karen Klessinger, Creative Director, Head of Destination Development, dan pearlman Markenarchitektur GmbH
Dietrich Mehrhoff, CEO, Landplus GmbH
Diana Anastasija Radke, Managing Partner, KVL Bauconsult GmbH
Martina Rozok, Managing Partner, ROZOK GmbH
Timm Sassen, CEO & Founder, Greyfield Group
Benjamin Slosharek, Sustainability Expert, KVL Bauconsult GmbH
Annabelle von Reutern, Head of Business Development, Concular GmbH
Matthias Werner, Managing Partner, KVL Bauconsult Munich GmbH
Dorothee Wetzler-Stöbe, CEO, STÖBE Agency for Communication GmbH
https://www.fuerbauenimbestand.de
