Federal Building Minister Barbara Hendricks opened the International Conference on Sustainable Built Environment (SBE 16) in Hamburg today. At the three-day conference, approximately 400 participants from 20 countries will discuss interdisciplinary topics related to sustainable building. The conference is part of the Sustainable Building Conference series, which has been running since 1998. The minister stated: "Sustainable development needs active commitment from all stakeholders. This is why I am delighted that municipalities are participating in this conference too. The transformation towards a new way of life starts in our cities and towns. It is now a matter of joining forces to achieve a climate-neutral building stock and improve the overall quality of our built environment. We have set out our understanding of how buildings should be constructed and managed in future in our Guidelines for Sustainable Building, which serve as binding standards for federal buildings. These guidelines were updated just last year. I am very pleased that an English version of the guidelines was published in time for this year’s conference." The aim of the conference is to implement sustainability principles in the building sector and promote knowledge transfer related to sustainable building at national and international level. The focus will be on the latest European research findings. Issues to be discussed at SBE 16 include:
- Strategies and framework conditions for sustainable building and sustainable urban development
- Innovative approaches and case studies of sustainable development of neighbourhoods, cities and towns
- Application of sustainability methods and tools in the building and real estate sectors
- Research on material and product innovations
Participants will include architects, engineers, city planners, scientists, representatives from the building industry and policy-makers from more than 20 countries. The conference will take place under the sponsorship of the Federal Building Ministry. Other sponsoring agencies include the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), the International Council for Research and Innovation in Building and Construction (CIB), the International Initiative for a Sustainable Build Environment (iiSBE) and the International Federation of Consulting Engineers (FIDIC). Further information about the conference, the criteria for sustainable building, databases providing life-cycle assessments of construction products and electronic planning tools are available online.