The design of collective decision-making processes for community driven retrofitting

"There is an existing and ever growing split between individualized responsibilities and the collective energy transition"

Project outline
The deployment of energy reduction actions jointly across multiple buildings at once are much needed to reach the climate targets of reaching a reduction of 3.4 megatons of CO2 for the built environment. In the Netherlands, over 1.5 million homes are part of associations of co-owners VvE (Vereniging van Eigenaren). Each dweller is accountable for their own energy use, while being constrained with their own financial capacity and a shared will to act with other buildings co-owners. There is an existing and ever growing split between individualized responsibilities and the collective energy transition, which has led to fragmented scale and scope responses to the energy retrofitting challenges. 

Collect Your Retrofits intends to design a replicable and collective retrofit approach in the context of monumental areas while reframing the cultural notion of energy. As opposed to the current energy system where one is individually incentivized, the research aims to support VvE communities in making collective and informed multi-criteria decisions for energy-efficiency retrofit solutions. 

The project develops the collective approach under the real conditions of two communities: a self-organized woongroep and a VvE in the historic center of Amsterdam. Instead of each owner investing into their own energy retrofitting, the community would invest into the most impactful measures and ensure that the generated economic value is retained locally in order to make further sustainable investments. Ultimately, this approach would allow innovative practices to emerge such as large-scale visions of energy retrofitting strategies for historic areas.

"The energy transition is much more than solely a technical challenge; it is about defining a system in which societal missions are pursued and facilitated, by design."

The theme "Working together for impact” captures the essence of the project. The energy transition is much more than solely a technical challenge; it is about defining a system in which societal missions are pursued and facilitated, by design. At the intersection between strategic design, building technology and citizen science, the project brings the creative industry (Superworld) together with knowledge institutions (TU Delft and AMS Institute) and combines data-driven and social science approaches to solve the dilemma faced by VvEs regarding energy retrofitting. The Gemeente Amsterdam and Stichting !WOON give complementary advice on the applicability of the research outcomes to existing processes. 

At the start of the project, the consortium quickly realized that the collaboration needs to go beyond translating technical data into attractive visuals. To encourage decision-making, it is necessary to fully engage the communities and to nourish conversations that would not normally take place about sustainable retrofitting. The research collaboration was therefore remodeled from data visualization to collective process design, thereby focusing on: how to shape a decision-making process for energy retrofitting as a non-zero-sum game, where one's win does not necessarily mean another's loss? 

At the moment, the team is currently putting in place the scaffolding for a scalable approach of simulation based retrofit measures through Augmented Negotiations. It combines: (1) a digital energy modeling system to support (2) the human, and intrinsically social experience of collective decision making. The collaborative research project is as much about interaction design with building data, as it is about the design of an inclusive participation process aiming to bring energy as a collective resource. Results will be analyzed in the next weeks after being tested with a first community.

Artefact
‍The object chosen to represent our collaboration is one of the cards designed collaboratively as support for energy negotiations between inhabitants. It represents the association of the different specialties that were channeled together: process and matter design, building energy modeling, and stakeholder engagement.