‘Carbon Stories: Circular in 2050, Dream or Reality?’ is now online!
Thursday 30 November GROUP A | CARBONLAB, International Architecture Biennale Rotterdam (IABR) and KeileCollectief organized the debate ‘Carbon Stories: Circular in 2050, Dream or Reality?’. Metabolic, New Horizon, RE-BORN Real Estate and BlueCity share their perspectives on maximizing the potential of circularity to reduce CO2 emissions in the built environment. Watch the debate online.
The UN Climate Change Conference kicks off in Dubai (UEA) on 30 November 2023. This edition is preceded by global developments that demand immediate action. June and July 2023 broke the records of the warmest planetary months ever documented. Changing international relations revealed once again the fragility of our increased global dependence on supplies of energy and materials. > Our carbon footprint and global resource dependence needs to be radically reduced. EU and Dutch policy aims to realize this. An important part focuses on achieving a fully circular society and economy by 2050.
This affects the core of our sector. We produce, transport and assemble materials to create built environments. So how circular can we become and how much CO2 emissions do we avoid in doing so? What does it require from different disciplines in our sector to get there? Can we create profitable circular projects? Besides less dependence and less CO2 emissions, what are other benefits of a circular practice? How could these questions land in Rotterdam’s future urban area M4H? How to achieve a fundamental understanding of circular potential and how do we apply this in practice in an era of urgency where every ton of saved CO2 counts?
These questions will be addressed in the debate that will be moderated by Geert Maarse.
Nico Schouten, Senior Sustainability Consultant Built Environment at Metabolic will provide the EU and Dutch context for the potential of circularity and CO2 reduction. Michel Baars, founder New Horizon Urban Mining, will take us through the journey of harvesting materials from existing buildings and transforming them into resources for new projects. Saman Mohammadi, CEO of RE:BORN Real Estate will illustrate how circular transformation developments are a lucrative development model and Sabine Biesheuvel director BlueCity & chairman Rotterdam Climate Table Circularity will infuse the conversation with the Rotterdam and M4H perspective.
