Construction of the innovative building and living environment competence centre to require 4.5 million euros and 3.5 years
Today the Innovative Building and Living Environment Competence Centre supervisory board approved the budget and cost-benefit study for the construction of the competence centre. The aforesaid documents were prepared on the basis of the strategy and activity plan approved on 3 December 2010. The cost of building the centre will be 4.5 million euros and it will take 3.5 years. The application for financing will be submitted for close to 3.2 million euros in the framework of the Enterprise Estonia competence centre development programme while the rest of the necessary resources will be obtained through the sale of services and grants.
The efficiency and eco-friendliness of the living environment determines people’s health and quality of life and the long-term sustainability of humanity and natural resources. This field has become an important topic and priority on very different levels.
Competence centres are associations that are based on innovative cooperation between public authorities, research and development institutions and companies. The work of the Innovative Building and Living Environment Competence Centre involves universities, entrepreneurs and organizations whose competence allows them to introduce to the general public alternative energy sources, economical and ecological construction techniques and the living environment. The competence centre consolidates top-level knowledge in the field of creation of economical and ecological living environments and enables public access and rapid and extensive spread of knowledge.
The main goal of the competence centre is to develop private enterprise and export capacity in its own field. Development of the centre envisions studies, entrepreneurial consultation, and creation of a demonstration, training and export environment. The total cost of the project in the period 2011-2014 is planned to be 4.5 million euros.
To establish a demonstration environment, the competence centre has begun active cooperation with Estonian ECO, ICT and Wind Energy clusters; and for contributing to export capacity negotiations have been launched with the Association of Construction Material Producers of Estonia, the Estonian Association of Architectural and Consulting Engineering Companies and other leading organizations in the field of construction; and procurements have been conducted for finding a partner for construction of the competence centre’s test, export and demonstration environment.
The following partners are taking part in the Competence Centre project: Innovative Building and Living Environment Competence Centre Foundation, the University of Tartu Institute of Technology, the Tallinn University Institute of Ecology, the Tallinn University of Technology’s Institute of Materials Engineering, Roheline Mõte OÜ, PassiveHouse OÜ, Safran OÜ, Laudo OÜ, Covertech Invest, Allianss Arhitektid OÜ, MTÜ Creative Union, Otepää municipality, Valga County Vocational Education Centre and Estonian Ecotourism and ECO cluster.
