18. Jul 2011 - Award ceremony for the BMWi “Architecture with Energy” prize 2011

Abstract

Peter Hintze, Parliamentary State Secretary in the German Federal Ministry of Economics and Technology, today presented the awards in the BMWi’s “Architecture with Energy” competition. At an award ceremony held in the “Eichensaal” hall at the German Federal Ministry of Economics and Technology, the design teams from the six winning building projects were awarded the BMWi Prize 2011.In addition to prize money totalling 120,000 euros, the award winners will each receive plaques that can be fixed to the buildings.

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The German Federal Ministry of Economics and Technology launched the “Architecture with Energy” competition in January 2011 at the BAU 2011 international trade fair in Munich. The competition is aimed at ambitious building projects that combine energy efficient building concepts and innovative technologies with high quality architecture and which can be considered as leading the way for buildings of the future.

This is because improvements to energy efficiency are both technically and economically realisable in the building sector. The award-winning building projects convincingly prove that zero-emission buildings do not have to remain a distant vision but are already reality today. State Secretary Hintze praised the award winners for setting the benchmark for buildings of the future.

The winning building designs will be presented on the EnOB website.

The competition

The BMWi “Architecture with Energy” prize was aimed at concrete projects with groundbreaking building concepts. They should be able to provide creative, conceptual and technologically convincing answers to the challenges set. New-build schemes, renovations of existing buildings and projects that combined refurbishment and new buildings were awarded. Architects, specialist designers, developers and cooperative groups were able to take part.

This is the second time that the BMWi Prize 2011 has been awarded, the first being in 2009. Newly introduced this year was a category for students, who could take part with forward-thinking designs and concepts. A highly prestigious panel of judges selected six prize winners from the 35 projects that were submitted. The prize winners were each awarded the BMWi Prize 2011 in the form of a symbolic building plaque and received prize money totalling 120,000 euros. In addition, the awarded projects have the possibility to be funded in their further realisation and commissioning as model projects as part of the EnOB – Energy-optimised Construction research initiative funded by the German Federal Ministry of Economics and Technology.

Energy policy context

With its energy concept, the German government wants to sufficiently modernise the existing building stock so that the building sector is climate neutral by 2050. That is an extremely ambitious goal. As part of the amendment to the German Energy Saving Ordinance (EnEV), it is planned as a first step that all new buildings should be climate neutral by 2020. For refurbishments, the intention is to achieve an 80% reduction of the primary energy consumption in the long term.