The outPHit project aims to support building owners and housing companies in performing reliable, quicker and more cost-effective deep retrofits. Working on and collecting findings from real refurbishment projects, outPHit will promote renovation concepts like the Energiesprong approach or one-stop-shop solutions, but in highly efficient quality to NZEBs in EnerPHit standard, to stakeholders among neighbourhoods, municipalities, financing institutions and the building supply chain. It will lay the ground for regional players, particularly SMEs, to enter the market as providers of innovative out-of-the-box solutions, either consisting of conventional renovation concepts or of highly efficient prefabricated systems. While the focus is on residential buildings, most of the proposed approaches will also apply to non-residential buildings, thus widening the scope to educational and office buildings.

Reaching of the 2020 and 2030 energy and climate objectives represents a major challenge to the construction sector, which needs to be ready to deliver high energy performing renovations and, in particular, nearly zero-energy buildings. This goal requires a major effort to increase the number of qualified construction specialists at all levels, which is directly related to the accessibility and quality of the training and educational programmes and the inclusion of training on intelligent energy efficiency and RES solutions in building renovation. Responding to these needs, the project is designed to: (i) Elaborate a set of technological competences and learning outcomes on deep energy renovation; (ii) Develop new large scale training schemes and programmes on deep energy renovation at all levels of the vocational education and training (VET) system; (iii) Review the national educational plans and initiate the necessary changes; (iv) Establish capacity for professional training of trainers and train a sufficient number of trainers; (v) Support and monitor pilot courses on the new programmes on deep energy renovation at all levels. The leading objective of the Fit-to-nZEB project proposal is to deliver all necessary requisites for the introduction of educational content on deep energy renovation of buildings in the curricula at all levels of the educational and training system in Southeastern Europe. This will be done both through incorporation of new educational content in existing curricula and through the development of new specialized programs. This process will be guided by the understanding of the complex nature of building retrofit, combining various building disciplines and allowing integrated design and cross-craft understanding with special focus on practical exercises and demonstrations. An essential element of the project is the creation and deployment of certification schemes and accreditation procedures corresponding to the EQF.

RINNO envisions to deliver a framework solution that will help drastically accelerating the rate of deep renovation in EU building stock reaching an ambitious annual renovation rate of 3.5%. Its ultimate goal is to develop, validate and demonstrate an operational interface with augmented intelligence and an occupant-centered approach that will streamline and facilitate the whole lifecycle of building renovation (planning-design, retrofitting, monitoring). This concept has at its foundation, a set of cost-attractive, environmentally friendly, multi-functional and easily applicable building-related innovations, grouped into: a) plug-n-play, modular building envelope solutions and b) RES, hybrid and storage solutions. RINNO couples the above with innovative retrofitting processes, methods and tools, characterized by low tenants’ disruption. These comprise: efficient (off/on-site) construction strategies, on-the-job AR facilitating environment and multi-stakeholder collaboration, which are expected to shrink the time and cost required for deep renovation, while improving buildings’ performance; all with a short payback period of <4 years on average. The above will be supported businesswise with novel business models aligned with the circular economy principles, enriched with investment de-risking tools and advanced crowd-equity/crowd-lending schemes. RINNO is expected to impact the EU inefficient building stock by a) reaching an ambitious annual renovation rate of 3.5%; b) primary energy savings of 165 GWh/year; c) a reduction of electricity cost by at least 30%; d) a total cost / time reduction in comparison with typical renovation by more than 30% and 40% respectively, and e) an estimated reduction of 40,400 tons CO2-eq/year. RINNO optimized renovation roadmap will be demonstrated at 4 large scale (3,386m2) pilot use cases after being pre-piloted, covering different EU climatic zones and markets of diverse maturity in the renovation sector.

SIRCULAR intends to create digital tools, technological solutions and non-technical services for the decarbonisation of the built environment, as well as a ready-to-use methodology for assessing the circularity of a given building capable of evaluating the impact of the developed construction technologies in the demos. These features are intended to improve access to information on decarbonisation for end users who are not experts in these fields, as well as to provide professionals working in the construction sector with tools capable of easily evaluating and improving the circularity of this area. The SIRCULAR solutions will take a multidisciplinary approach, integrating technical, economic, and social approaches with a focus on social and policy innovation, delivering valuable information to policymakers and establishing a solid foundation for the promotion of developed decarbonisation methods. The project will also be distinguished by an overall people-centric approach that prioritizes the needs, ambitions, and well-being of individuals and communities as critical players in the decarbonization of the construction industry. SIRCULAR will prioritize active participation, inclusion, and ethical concerns to ensure that the project's achievements directly benefit society as a whole. The project will also make special efforts to engage the whole supply chain engaged in all phases of the building's life cycle, with the goal of increasing the circularity and sustainability of each of them. SIRCULAR plans to consider four national clusters to promote a circular and sustainable construction sector using a value chain approach. The clusters will focus on Estonia and Spain, followed by Germany and Greece. The clusters will involve construction companies, housing companies, universities, and local administrative entities, and will include buildings owned or occupied by fragile population groups, in line with the SIRCULAR just and affordable transition approach.

Buildings are responsible for around 40% of energy consumption and 36% of CO2 emissions in the EU, and 84% of their demand is still generated by fossil fuels. With the Green Deal, the EU signed its commitment to become the first continent to achieve climate neutrality by 2050. Given the high relevance of the building sector for emissions reduction, the concept of PEBs is gaining increasing attention. Besides, construction and demolition waste accounts for 35% of EU waste. REN+HOMES tackle the sustainable transition not only by reducing carbon emissions, but also resource scarcity, energy poverty and focusing on education/participation of stakeholders. REN+HOMES i) develops a set of 23 solution: 9 hardware (industrialized panel with recycled materials, pre-fabricated BIPV insulated façade, wireless IoT device, end user platform and BMS, LPWAN connectivity, geothermal walls, BIPV/BAPV with repurposed cells, H2 storage), 7 software (BDEA, INTEMA, VERIFY-B, GRT, TCQi, RCS, CBEO) and 7 Circular Plus Energy Homes (CPEH) methodologies (for AU, ES, EE, RO, EL, FR and a universal one), ii) tests and implements them in 4 large-scale demonstrators (19.843 m2 - 2 renovation and 2 new construction sites) in AU, ES, EE and RO and iii) develpes business models combining cost-effective deep-retrofitting, demand response and energy communities. REN+HOMES i) provide excess energy to the grid or to neighboring buildings (195MWh/yr), ii) develop and install building technologies from >50% recycled materials, iii) uses products with >60% recyclability rates, iv) adopt co-design for increasing awareness and satisfaction (>70 residents per demo) and v) make use of international support to overcome legislative barrier, for the streamlining of positive energy homes, with a focus on resource scarcity and recyclability. REN+HOMES approach will lead >50M m2 of floor area renovated to CPEH standards, corresponding to 1.56 MtCO2-eq saved and 39.226 tons of recycled materials by 2050.