Cities and urban populations continue to rapidly transform with 75% of the world population currently living in urban areas with an expected increase of more than 10% in the next 30 years. As a consequence, there is a growing need to optimise the use of available space. Cities are responsible for over 70% of global energy consumption and CO2 emissions, of which, buildings account for 40% of the EU's energy consumption, 36% of its CO2 emissions and 55% of its electricity consumption. For the above, the emissions and energy savings in this sector is vital to meeting the EU's climate and energy targets. Besides, the stock of buildings in the EU is relatively old, with more than 40% of it built before 1960 and 90% before 1990. On the other hand, climate change is changing drastically the global precipitation patterns all across Europe, causing several problems due to the lack of capacity to remove the excess of water from the city, especially during short and extreme precipitation peaks (i.e. currently 30% heavier rainfall), which are causing floods in European (quadrupled since 1980) with the associated economic losses. Moreover, periods of drought and heat will increase due to the lack of green areas and the over-concentration of urban areas (urban heat island effect). This constitutes an important market opportunity for new technologies. Currently, the types of facades with different materials such as glass, concrete, brick, metal, stone or wooden facade, are less efficient and not sustainable, not helping to mitigate the effects of climate change.
Therefore, Kre_ta GmbH has successfully developed KlimaFaçade, an innovative, flexible, easy to install and cost-effective modular façade to transform new and old buildings in Europe in environmentally friendly green buildings. Our module reduces noise, installation costs (60%), maintenance costs, surface temperature (3-4°C) and the carbon footprint. KlimaFaçade is equipped with a specific developed water storage & management unit (substrate and hydro-gel) which can store 75 l/m2 and impel a high evapotranspiration rate up to 15 l/m2/hour. The basic structure can be combined with standard photovoltaic panels or with plant (green) modules. KlimaFaçade can be installed on all existing types of substructures counting with fast installation, leading to a more cost-effective and sustainable construction. Furthermore, green infrastructure increases the property value. Therefore, now the environmental and economic benefit of living walls and roofs is hard to ignore.
With the support of the European Commission, KlimaFaçade can accelerate the upscaling and keep R&D and pilot line activities on a high level to further upgrade the system quality and to develop more technological research. Moreover, KlimaFaçade is a great chance to extend Europe- and worldwide contacts to potential customers. It is important to highlight that KlimaFaçade’s commercialization will generate high revenues in the targeted market segments of green construction (market share 20%). This equals to an approximate number of more than 35.000 m2 façade generating additional revenue streams of 18.5 M€ for our company from 2019-2025 as well as to triple our workforce by 2025 only in Europe. This ambitious target is reachable by forming a European network of regional suppliers, representatives, and costumers in each targeted country.
