Heritage Impact

Research

Learn

Showcase

Empower

Connect

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Renovation and rehabilitation of cultural heritage buildings avoid unnecessary greenhouse gas emissions, preserve the heritage capital of EU, and promote the sustainable development of cities, including economic growth, social wellbeing, and environmental preservation, in line with circular economy rules.

Researching, beyond the state of the art

To meet the EU targets for 2030, a 65% reduction is required of the embodied carbon in buildings. This requires improving energy efficiency in existing buildings to reduce operational carbon, applying passive energy conservation measures and the use of renewable energy, and selecting materials with low embodied carbon, while providing the necessary performance attributes.

SINCERE research contributes to this goal by researching innovative technologies for reducing the carbon footprint of the most popular building material today, concrete, and improving the efficiency, durability, and flexibility of energy harvesting and radiative cooling solutions.

The use of advanced visualization, modelling, and prediction tools, adjusted to the special needs of cultural heritage buildings, real-life experimentation in pilot sites with different architectural properties and climate conditions, and the active participation of citizens, leads to a holistic approach that can make a difference.

Understanding, the whole picture

The preservation of cultural heritage buildings is a complex technical, social, economic, and political process whose trade-offs, context-specificity, and path dependencies need to be well understood by all involved actors and stakeholders, those take decisions, and those affected by them.

SINCERE will produce a wide variety of educational and dissemination material that will provide a holistic perspective on the challenge of preserving cultural heritage for the past and future, delivered in different formats that can make accessible the main message to the whole spectrum of key actors.

Showcasing, heritage's impact

One of the most important drivers for positive transition are flagship projects and successful case studies. SINCERE pilots have the potential to become such success stories, each in their own domain, since they are very different between them, showcasing very interesting individual characteristics.

Taking the buildings’ perspective will make the communication of both technical and social aspects in an engaging and impactful way.

Empowering, everyone to do their best

it is essential to explore and develop tools, materials, and technologies for protecting from CC risks and enabling Built Heritage to contribute to the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) as described by UN in the “2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development”.

Although current debate on the contribution of Built Heritage tends to focus on technical issues, countries recognise the important role of its preservation regarding the cultivation of cultural identity across generations, the citizens’ quality of life and social and well-being.

SINCERE will produce a variety of tools and processes that will empower a variety of actors to join forces for preserving cultural heritage buildings in ways that are sustainable: Built Heritage managers, Construction Companies, Architectural and Engineering Design offices, Renovation Industry, Owners of listed and new buildings, and Industrial Heritage sectors.

Connecting, the cultural heritage buildings of Europe

The SINCERE building-stories platform will bring together the stories of the individual buildings in a single digital platform, forming an interactive dialogue between buildings.

This innovative framework has the potential not only to bring the SINCERE scientific outcomes and dissemination activities to a wider audience, but to put the seed for a network of cultural heritage buildings that goes beyond the SINCERE ecosystem.