On 5 June 2019, Claude Turmes, Minister for Energy and Town and Country Planning, visited Bettembourg at the Institut de Formation Sectoriel du Bâtiment in order to find out on the spot how the GROOF (Greenhouses to Reduce CO2 on Roofs) project carried out as part of the Interreg North-West Europe 2014-2020 programme is being put into practice.
In the presence of Yuriko Backes, Head of the Representation of the European Commission in Luxembourg, and in the presence of Kristine Kozlova, Technical Adviser to the European Commission's DG ECFIN, the Minister had the opportunity to discuss with Bruno Renders, Director of the Building Sector Training Institute, about the urban greenhouse that will soon be installed on the roof of the institute.
Named SOTA (for State Of The Art), this greenhouse of more than 600 m² will produce 10 tonnes of fresh leafy vegetables with a view to encouraging local consumption and the circular economy.
Claude Turmes, who is responsible for managing the Interreg Community programmes (Greater Region, Europe and North-West Europe), was impressed by the scale of the project and the objectives sought, stressing that "often for the visibility of Europe, small projects are more important than large investment projects".
GROOF project
In line with the urban farming strategy, the project aims at a cross-sectoral approach to reduce CO2 emissions from the construction and agricultural sectors by combining energy sharing and local food production using roof greenhouses as efficient equipment for :
-recovering heat produced and not consumed by the supporting building (actively and passively) ;
-the collection of CO2 produced by people and activities in the building to feed the plants;
- the reduction of CO2 emissions from transport through local plant production.
By investing in four rooftop greenhouse pilot projects, the project aims to demonstrate the sustainability and prove the efficiency of the models envisaged according to the different typologies of buildings and greenhouses. Following this experimentation phase, the operators aim to reveal the advantages of rooftop greenhouses in terms of CO2 emission reduction and to propose practical solutions that can be disseminated and implemented in a sustainable and long-term manner in the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg and the Greater Region as well as on the North-West European market.
The four-year project runs from 2017 to 2021 and is coordinated by the Conseil pour le développement économique du secteur de la construction (CDEC) with 10 partners from five different countries :
Institut de formation aux métiers de la construction (LU),
Université de Liège, Gembloux Agro-Bio Tech (BE),
Groupe One (BE),
Cluster Éco-construction (BE),
Centre scientifique et technique du bâtiment (FR),
Gally Farms (FR),
Astredhor, Institut technique de l’horticulture (FR),
EBF GmbH (DE),
Hochschule Trier Institut für angewandtes Stoffstrommanagement (DE),
Université autonome de Barcelone (E).
Photo : ©DATER Visite du projet GROOF, Greenhouses to Reduce CO2 on Roofs
de g. à d. : Claude Turmes; Kristine Kozlova; Yuriko Backes; Bruno Renders
Source : Communiqué de presse : https://mea.gouvernement.lu/fr/actualites/article/2018/06_juin/Visite_Projet_GROOF.html
