From January 2019 to June 2022, a cross-university and cross-disciplinary consortium of 12 doctoral students, including Simon Slabik, M.Sc. from the Chair of Resource Efficient Building, has been working at the Research College "Sustainable energy systems in the district". The aim is to develop technical, economic and social control models to increase energy efficiency in the district.

After a first phase of the Research College "Energy efficiency in neighbourhoods", during which obstacles to the realisation of energy efficiency measures were identified, it is now a matter of reacting to these in a second funding phase and finally progressing with implementation. The consortium will develop technical as well as business and control models that will ultimately make it easier for actors such as municipal utilities, municipalities, politicians and citizens to promote the energy system transformation in the area. In this way, the consortium contributes to a better understanding for and between the disciplines and scientists as well as actors.

On the content level, a detailed consideration of the topic of energy efficiency is necessary, so that the fields of living, working, leisure, structural-spatial conditions, socio-demographic structures, economic and cultural-historical context, technical requirements or legal framework conditions of a district are taken into account. This makes it easier to identify cause-and-effect relationships and to derive measures for larger spatial dimensions. In addition to the Ruhr area, a further spatial focus is on the Rhineland.

Due to the growing population, the Research College is also dedicated to the future-oriented construction of new districts (e.g. land recycling, collective uses, new mobility concepts).

Three collegiates or chairs each will now focus on four task-oriented topic clusters:

- Integrated reconstruction of energy infrastructures
- Activate Actors / Users / Owners
- Establishing new methods for sustainability at district level
- Creating the framework conditions for implementation.

The consortium consists of RWTH Aachen University (lead partner), Ruhr University and Bochum University of Applied Sciences, Dortmund Technical University, Duisburg-Essen University and the Wuppertal Institute for Climate, Environment and Energy. In addition, a wide range of actors from the field are involved in an advisory capacity. The Ministry of Culture and Science North Rhine-Westphalia sponsors the project. Further information can be found in the following flyer of the Research College (in German).

Flyer Research College (5.5 MB)