<
https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20240403-the-race-to-retrofit-europes-ex-communist-housing>
'
From Prague to Plovdiv, engineers and architects are giving a second life to
communist-built apartment blocks in Central and Eastern Europe, ready for the
climate change era.
One of the oldest residents of one of the tallest building in Gabrovo city,
Bulgaria, is former engineer Hristo Hristov. At nearly 90 years old and "still
obsessed" with how things fit together, Hristov has lived in the block since it
was built three decades ago. The block was designed in the 1970s, before the
arrival of energy efficiency standards in Bulgaria, and completed in 1994.
Until 2020, this 16-storey tower block was typical of the apartment buildings
that dominate the skyline of not just Gabrovo, but cities across Central and
Eastern Europe. Many of these blocks are cold, draughty and expensive to heat.
Today, Hristov's block is warm and dry and energy bills in the block are half
what they used to be.
The change is down to a full energy retrofit of the tower, coordinated by
Hristov. It required getting the agreement of every resident in the block to
proceed – but, incredibly, this was achieved. "A final few had us like a slow
roast on a spit," he says, making use of an old Bulgarian phrase. "But there
are 80 families here and even with full funding some people, understandably,
needed persuading," he says. "These are their homes."
Now the concrete block, left bare for decades, is well insulated, its old
balconies are enclosed, and it is clad in clean pastel colours. As one of the
first blocks to be renovated in Gabrovo, the tower signaled the start of a slow
change to the post-industrial city. And Gabrovo's transformation is in turn
part of a change happening across hundreds of cities in the region, as
post-communist countries look to upgrade their crumbling apartment blocks.
As climate change puts pressure on cities to use less energy to heat and cool
buildings, and to help insulate residents against temperature extremes, the
race to retrofit these apartment blocks is only getting more urgent.'
Via
Positive.News
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
