Achievements of Lighthouse City Vitoria-Gasteiz in the framework of SmartEnCity Project

SmartEnCity PROJECT SCOPE in Coronacíon, demo district of Lighthouse City Vitoria-Gasteiz

CITIZEN ENGAGEMENT

The first step of the citizen engagement process was for the local project team to invests time into making the project and value proposal understandable. The second included to share this information with the citizens through multiple means. The third step consisted of developing the offer – the retrofitting package – as clearly and specifically as possible. Because of the several challenges appeared during the project, this phase took quite a long time. However, this period was used to introduce other aspects of the project to the citizens, for example district renovation options for the neighbourhood. For the fourth step, once the product/service was defined clearly and in sufficient detail, it was time to share it. This was achieved through several initiatives like exhibitions with small conferences and roundtables with the project team explaining the retrofitting package to the visitors and many others.

• 10 public informative events
• > 400 meetings with communities of homeowners
• > 400 phone calls to homeowners
• > 1600 visits attended in the Information Office
• 650 door-to-door campaign visits
• 1650 advertising cards in mail campaigns
• Public informative events about energy efficiency awareness and recommendations to keep their renovated building comfortable and healthy
• Meetings with communities of homeowners
• Reports about retrofitting impact on dwellings to be used as an example at informative meetings
• Phone campaign to gather citizens questions and doubts
• Citizen satisfaction survey before project is ending

During the retrofitting phase of the project Visesa took the role of Delegated Promoter. Regarding retrofitting works, Visesa acts as one-stop shop for administrating, contracting and supervising both the design and execution of the rehabilitation following a turnkey model as well as administrating the financing on behalf of the beneficiaries.

And finally, once the retrofitting works finished, the next citizen engagement actions were carried out:

• Public informative events about energy efficiency awareness and recommendations to keep their renovated building comfortable and healthy
• Meetings with communities of homeowners
• Reports about retrofitting impact on dwellings to be used as an example at informative meetings
• Phone campaign to gather citizens questions and doubts
• Citizen satisfaction survey before project is ending

SmartEnTip

• Where to have the citizen engagement activities? Location is the key!
• Keep close to the citizens! Despite main works have finished, communication must remain til the end of the project (and beyond)
• Where to have the citizen engagement activities? Location is the key!
  
• Keep close to the citizens! Despite main works have finished, communication must remain til the end of the project (and beyond)

BUILDING ENERGY RETROFITTING

The building renovation intervention consists mainly of envelope retrofitting, which involves the intervention in the façade and roof, improving envelope’s insulation and airtightness and installing new low-energy windows, if needed. The Coronación neighbourhood was chosen in Vitoria Gasteiz for this intervention as it was identified as the city’s most vulnerable neighbourhood in terms of social issues, stability, habitability, accessibility and energy efficiency. This district reflects the major challenges in terms of retrofitting and implementation of smart city concepts: very high density, low-medium income and relevant social dimension.

The technical approach to achieve high levels of energy efficiency and CO2 emissions reduction has been based in two main pillars:

• Update of the building envelope
  • Insulation of the façade and roof (12-14 cm) ETICS
  • Installation of a double window or replacement of the existing one
• Improvement of heat distribution system (inside the building) and connection to the new district heating network deployed in the district by project partners

In the beginning of the project, the estimated costs for the retrofitting interventions was 21,000 EUR on average per dwelling, including the connection to the district heating network. There are some buildings where the costs are higher because of its initial characteristics (more complex interventions due to existing walls). The final price for the house owners, after discounting the H2020, Basque Government and Vitoria Gasteiz Municipality grants, was expected to be 9,600 EUR on average. In addition, the Basque Government and Vitoria Gasteiz Municipality created a guarantee fund for those who cannot afford this investment.

Retrofitting works ended on July 31^st, 2021, and final figures shows that the deviation between estimated cost and actual cost for the beneficiaries has been, in average lower, than a 5%.

Retrofitted buildings in Vitoria-Gasteiz' demo district Coronacíon. Picture@VISESA

Examples of retrofitted facades in demo district Coronacíon. Picture@VISESA

The benefits of this action include:

• Increased property values
• Increased health and quality of life
• Increased energy efficiency
• Reduction of energy bills
• Reduction of carbon emissions
• Increased comfort
• Social integration
• Behavioural change and sustainability awareness

DISTRICT HEATING NETWORK

Integrated infrastructure deployed in Vitoria Gasteiz consisted of a new District Heating Network with a central boiler room equipped with 2 biomass boilers fed with local biomass and 2 gas back-up gas boilers to attend eventual consumption peaks and maintenance tasks. For the distribution network, a two-pipe system with pre-insulated piping and leak detection monitoring systems was chosen.

A resource management centre (RMC) enables optimum management of the district heating production and distribution system. A website for on-line consultation and information on energy consumption gathers this information.

The new infrastructure started service in June 2021 and supplies thermal energy for heating and domestic hot water to:

• 293 dwellings, which have been retrofitted and connected to the District Heating within SmartEnCity European Project.
• 206 equivalent dwellings, which represent the consumption of a Gym & Spa and the district parish church who also joined the project

Additionally, GIROA – VEOLIA extended its commercial effort to engage new costumers beyond demo district boundaries. This action contributed to gain 125 additional dwellings not participating in SmartEnCity but fostering District Heating economic sustainability. 

The benefits of this action include:

• Reduction in overall installed power, due to a simultaneity factor
• Increasing system performance at neighbourhood level
• Reduction of general maintenance and operation costs.
• Access to better energy prices (economy of scale)
• Improved security in dwellings (without fuel), as well as a significant reduction in disturbances and operation/maintenance tasks by building owners/tenants
• Increasing resource and energy efficiency
• Independence in energy supply
• Reduction of carbon emissions

SmartEnTIP

ENGAGE CITIZENS OUT FROM PROJECT BOUNDARIES

New District-Heating Network in Vitoria-Gasteiz. Picture@VISESA

SUSTAINABLE MOBILITY

The deployment of high capacity and 100% electric public transport is crucial for sustainable mobility to achieve carbon neutral cities in the near future. In this regard, the Vitoria-Gasteiz City Council, the provincial government and the Basque Government agreed to finance the evolution of the circular bus-line with the highest number of passengers in the city (Line 2) into a modern and clean electric bus rapid transit line with 48 bus-stops (24 for each direction), 4 ultra-fast inverted pantographs, 7 articulated e-buses and 6 conventional-size e-buses (18 meters long with a capacity of 139 people and 12 meters long for 90 people, respectively).

The smart electric bus (acronym BEI in Spanish) covers a route of over 10 kms with a service frequency of 8 minutes and circulating through exclusive lanes for a large part of the route. BEI service started running on regular basis on March 2022.

New Smart Electric Bus (BEI) in Vitoria-Gasteiz. Picture@VISESA

Other mobility actions carried out in Vitoria Gasteiz thanks to SmartEnCity:

• Substitution of partners´ fleet vehicles to EV (Implemented in 2020): 2 eVehicles in AVG/CEA, 2 in Visesa and 1 in Giroa
• Electric car charging points: 2 in Visesa. Implemented at the end of 2019.
• E-bike sharing station at AVG/CEA to foster sustainable and active mobility among the CEA and AVG workers. Implemented in 2020
• 1,304 Tn/year CO2 savings with Smart Electric Bus
• 1 ton of CO2 emissions saved in 10 months by the eBikes hub in Municipality

Benefits of these actions include:

• 1,304 Tn/year CO2 savings with Smart Electric Bus
• 1 ton of CO2 emissions saved in 10 months by the eBikes hub in Municipality

SmartEnTIP

IF YOU PUT THE MEANS, PEOPLE WILL RESPOND

CITY INFORMATION OPEN PLATFORM

Urban management systems, most commonly known as city platforms, are complex ICT tools designed to help develop and implement smart strategies of cities. For Vitoria-Gasteiz, the platform supplies the city with a solution where all existing ICT systems are integrated, and provide a solution for the systematic migration of sectorial legacy systems into the new city platform.

During the project, the core of the system was developed and deployed in addition to a number of specific software modules and 9 new applications, which provide management solutions for activities in the areas of energy efficiency for buildings, urban mobility and citizen engagement.

The applications developed during the project are the next:

• Thermal energy demand prediction tool for energy planning
• Municipal energy consumption monitoring (Vitoria-Gasteiz)
• GIS3D viewer for KPIs
• KPI Evaluation tool
• Local TV news channel
• ESCO Comfort Tools
• Tools to support the installation and management of measurement equipment
• Monitoring of energy consumption and home comfort
• BEI (Smart Electric Bus Monitoring)

All these applications are available in https://vitoria-gasteiz.smartencity.eu

New City Information Open Platform (CIOP) in Vitoria-Gasteiz.

Benefits of this actuation include:

• Real-time information on comfort conditions in the dwellings
• Impact calculation of the energy retrofitting of the houses based on real data
• Direct citizen engagement with local news of interest
• Forecast of energy demand based on customer comfort preferences High level visualisation of indicators and KPIs online and in real time

PROJECT BENEFITS AND RESULTS:

Energy and sustainability benefits:

• 90% reduction of CO2 emissions
• Savings of up to 50% in energy consumption
• Average Savings of 20% in household energy bills.
• Energy Certification A in all the rehabilitated properties.
• Total substitution of gas by renewable energy sources for domestic hot water and heating: local biomass. Lower CO2 print.
• Enhanced mobility opportunities for citizens with Smart Electric Bus

Social benefits:

• General Satisfaction of the residents, specifically with Visesa’s one-stop-shop role.
• Aesthetic Improvement of the neighbourhood and increased property values. Efficient use of rehabilitated dwellings by informed residents with better controlling capability thanks to the installed monitoring systems

SmartEnTIP

EMPOWERED CITIZENS, EFFICIENT DWELLINGS

City effects: “SmartEnCity has not only been a DISTRICT Project but a CITY project”

• Mirror effect on other buildings and neighbourhoods not connected to the project. Up to 50 dwellings retrofitted within the demo site.
• Fostering local employment:
  • 14 architectural firms
  • 5 building companies
  • Dozens of SMES (scaffolding and construction materials, energy certification, thermography, professional photographers, notaries, property management companies, etc.

SmartEnTIP

DISTRICT ACTUATION, CITY EFFECT

Some examples of the abovementioned benefits:

AWARDS

SmartEnTIP

SPREAD THE WORD, IT’S WORTH IT!