WISBA course of studies for sustainable building starts in Munich

Wienerberger SustainableBuilding Academy starts into the second round on 15 September in Munich. 24 students from various universities in Austria, Belgium, Germany, Hungary, Poland, and Switzerland address key aspects of sustainable building in international project teams. The aim is to teach future architects and civil engineers the fundamentals of sustainable building already during their studies.
 
How can you construct a building which avoids overheating in the summer and the associated energy costs for cooling? Which wall structures consume the fewest amount of resources? Can there be one “correct” method for the construction of energy-efficient buildings? The 24 participants of this year’s WISBA course of studies deal with these and other issues of sustainable building over the next four months and summarise their findings in project works.
“We want to give future architects and civil engineers the possibility to intensively deal with the topic of “Sustainable Building” already during their studies - because academic teaching still directs too little attention to this issue, which is of great significance for the future of building,” Heimo Scheuch, Chief Executive Officer of Wienerberger AG, explains one main concern of this training. Prof. Guillaume Habert from ETH Zurich adds: “WISBA enables the students to discuss their individual, culturally weighted views in the context of a larger and interdisciplinary platform and develop a common European understanding of sustainable construction”.
The WienerbergerSustainable BuildingAcademy is an international educational programme taking place for the second time this year. Whilst the premiere was attended by 12 students last year, the great success made it possible that 24 students will go through the course of studies this year and deepen their knowledge of sustainable construction. In addition to the previous partner universities Graz University of Technology, Warsaw University of Technology and Leibniz University Hannover, new partners for this term are ETH Zurich, Technische Universität München, Catholic University of Leuven, Vrije Universiteit Brussel, and Budapest University of Technology. On 15 September 2014, the current course will start in Munich with 24 students from different universities in Austria, Belgium, Germany, Hungary, Poland, and Switzerland – four each per country.
In the course of four workshops, which are partly held in all six countries simultaneously, the students are given the opportunity to expand and practically apply their knowledge by means of concrete problems. Sebastian Müller, student at Technische Universität München applied for the course of studies: “Because I can share my experience and my ideas with other architects and civil engineers as well as with scientists from all over Europe and help to promote the development of sustainable building materials and construction technologies of the future”.
The focus of the educational programme is on the project work on the subject of sustainable building, which the students – divided into interdisciplinary and international groups – will work out during the next four months in four workshops. Besides the start-up conference in Munich and the closing conference in Vienna in December, two parallel workshops will be held in Brussels and Warsaw in October as well as in Zurich and Budapest in November. Each topic is accompanied by a professor from the respective partner university.
Professor Péter Medgyasszay from Budapest University of Technology and Economics and his group will consider the question of how a building needs to be designed and constructed to work against excessive heat generation in the summer. The students working with Prof. Guillaume Habert from ETH Zurich will closely scrutinise the different European eco labels for buildings and analyse their effect on the assessment of buildings. Prof. Karen Allacker from the Catholic University of Leuven will support her group in calculating the ecological footprint of nearly zero energy houses in connection with different European standards. Analysing wall systems for their resource efficiency and searching for new concepts curbing the amount of waste arising from the demolition of buildings is the task the group of Prof. Jerzy Kwiatkowski from Warsaw University of Technology has to solve. Prof. Peter Maydl from Graz University of Technology and his group will explore wall structures, which encourage the use of environmentally friendly natural resources and substances. The sixth and last group will receive advice and support from Prof. Florian Musso, Technische Universität München, and look into the question whether there is one “correct” method in modern brick construction, which can meet current requirements especially with regards to energy consumption.
On 11 December 2014, all teams will present their results in front of an international committee. All costs of participation in the workshops including documentation, travel expenses, accommodation and catering are borne by Wienerberger. As in the first course, some students are after the completion of the programme provided the opportunity to do an internship at Wienerberger.
Wienerberger is the largest brick producer (Porotherm, Terca, Penter) in the world and market leader for clay tiles (Koramic, TONDACH) in Europe as well as for concrete blocks (Semmelrock) in Central-Eastern Europe. Building materials and system solutions made of brick provide for a healthy living environment, are economic and energy-saving. Brick contributes to the implementation of all energy-efficient building concepts such as low-energy, passive or solar houses. A life span of at least 100 years makes them high-value products. In the segment of pipe systems (ceramic tubes of the Steinzeug-Keramo brand and plastic pipes of the Pipelife brand), the company ranks among the leading suppliers in Europe. With 212 factories within the group, Wienerberger generated a turnover of 2,663 million € and an operating EBITDA of 267 million € in 2013.