Solar Decathlon 2011: The E-cube

Ghent University built the E-cube, a do-it-yoursef building kit for a solar powered zero energy house. It is their contribution to the Solar Decathlon 2011 Event that will take place on September 25 in Washington DC.

Keeping bees in town

In Brussels and Ghent, two cities in Belgium, two persons, independently from each other, were concerned about the dramatic decrease in bee population and decided to start an initiative to promote apiculture or beekeeping in the city. Liesbeth Hiele started the project Apicula in Ghent and Marc Wollast the project Apic Bruoc Sella in Brussels. They're both now beekeepers with several beehives on the roofs of buildings in Ghent and Brussels.
Read more about their story on the weblog Apicula or here (in Dutch) or the website of Apis Bruoc Sella (in French and Dutch).

Let's speak sustainable construction

Source: EESC

The European Economic and Social Committee (EESC), together with the Architects Council of Europe and the European Concrete Platform have developed the Sustainable Construction Glossary. It is a multilingual glossary, a dictionary-type publication in English-French-Spanish-German with common language terminology for sustainable construction.

Rotterdam Climate Initiative

The Rotterdam Climate Initiative is a collaboration between the city of Rotterdam, the port of Rotterdam and other partners with the ambitious goal to achieve a 50% CO2 reduction in the region of Rotterdam and to make Rotterdam climate proof by 2025.
Many interesting projects that support this climate program are described on the website (partly in English).
A nice project by TU Delft is the Rotterdam Energy Approach (REAP) to make the building stock energy neutral. More information on this project (report in Dutch) can be found here.

Stylish combination of solar shading and solar energy

Source: Webecoist

Tensil-Solar designed by SMIT (Sustainable Minded Interactive Technology): this flexible and recyclable fabric combines solar shading and solar energy production in a stylish way. More information and pictures on Webecoist and a video on Core77

Pattie Maes and Pranav Mistry demo SixthSense

This has nothing to do with sustainability, but, although this TED talk is already from 2009, it still is so astonishing and fascinating that I want to share it here on my blog.
Is this how the future will look like?
Pattie Maes and Pranav Mistry demo SixthSense Video on TED.com

Duurzaamheidstools

Op de website van de Vlaamse overheid vind je een overzicht van verschillende handleidingen en afwegingsinstrumenten voor duurzaam bouwen en wonen: van sociale woningen over kantoorgebouwen en scholen tot wijken.

Heat Pump Centre

The International Energy Agency IEA has many expert centres and networks in which research institutes from all over the world join their research efforts on specific energy related research.
The IEA Heat Pump Centre is such an international information centre on heat pump technologies. It operates already since 1978 and through its annexes and projects it developed a large amount of scientific information on heat pump technology.
Information on the IEA ECBCS network on Energy Conservation in Buildings and Community Systems can be found here.

Limburg klimaatneutraal tegen 2020

Bron: TACO2 rapport

De Belgische provincie Limburg heeft zich de ambitieuze doelstelling gesteld om tegen 2020 klimaatneutraal te zijn. Hoe zij dit denken te realiseren, kan je lezen in de TACO2 studie.