21st CFP Innovation Day: from sustainable toilets to heavenly oysters (Hall 2)
Diversity was omnipresent at CFP’s Innovation Day. It was an afternoon full of triggering conversations, innovative pitches and new collaborations. “This is where you come to play outside on a serious subject: to make the planet better.”
All 16 pitchers made the most of the five minutes given to them. Installers, real estate owners and bankers pricked up their ears. Critical questions, conversations about try-outs and a convivial drinks session followed.
In this article, read more about the pitches from RGS+, biocompact, CFP Green Buildings, FlexoWatts, Lumon, Solar Sedum, Presol and Oyster Heaven. Curious about the other eight pitches? Then read on here.
Sustainability with drones
Drones not only recall innovation, RGS+ shows that they help push boundaries. The cloud app can include all types of buildings. Photographs, drone footage and drawings record both the inside and outside of the building down to the last centimetre. Brian showed how the software breaks up the building into elements and gives them colour scores. By giving various parties access to the system, the data become insightful and scenarios can be worked out and compared. The biggest plus of RGS+? “That’s in passing on data to partners involved in the execution, such as roofers and building contractors. The data are reusable.”
Daily gamechanger biocompact
Roderick startled the audience with a picture of a toilet that could have been situated in any student accommodation and facts about bacteria released up to three metres into the air when flushing a standard toilet. But the real bottleneck is in the 20% of all drinking water used annually to flush toilets, while we face a drinking water shortage. The consequences are disastrous, including lower biodiversity and higher risk of forest fires. Biocompact convinced the public with their water-saving toilets and waterless urinals with no smell or other odour. Icing on the cake: the toilets can be installed in no time.
Making BREEAM easier
As it happens, water-saving toilets are one of the more simple and inexpensive swaps that building owners can implement to score better on BREEAM. If you want easy insights into the opportunities and most efficient ways to achieve sustainability using BREEAM, there is the BREEAM Portfolio Manager. CFP colleague Bram Weggemans explained all the ins and outs. Thanks to the holistic perspective, users easily monitor how far they have come towards achieving a level higher on BREEAM. Zooming in on specific topics such as ‘resilience’ helps discover what measures building owners can implement to even score better. Evidence can easily be obtained by means of uploaded photos and avoids the need for an on-site expert to visit, which saves time and money.
Smart use of energy
Getting down to work with energy management Michiel showed how FlexoWatts ‘s smart system provides a solution to grid congestion, the dynamic market and ever changing legislation. Instead of fiddling with calculations in Excel, here you use a simulation of your actual system with all devices that consume energy. This allows installers, real estate managers and consultants to work out all kinds of scenarios. What does an afternoon of cloud cover instead of sunshine do, and what is the impact of turning on equipment that uses 500 kW in the morning? Everything is calculable, so you can make smart decisions. Unique: FlexoWatts’ software open downloadable.
Greater sustainability using…balcony glass
The switch to specific measures to achieve greater sustainability was also featured, with the more than 60 visitors getting a glimpse of the versatility involved. Maurits, for instance, showed with infectious enthusiasm that a glass partitioning on balconies is not only stylish, but also offers sustainability and social benefits. Lumon‘s efficient balcony glass creates a heat buffer between outside and inside that is easy to implement. This is not only suitable for balconies of 10m² and larger, but also for the shallow balconies in flat blocks from the 1970s. Social benefits also come with noise reduction and a balcony that offers usable space all year round rather than just in summer. So Lumon offers sustainability and well-being improvement in one.
“Innovation Day has great speakers every year, but never before has the quality of the pitches been so high.“
– Bram Adema, CEO of CFP Green Buildings
Win-win on your roof
Roofs are one of the pillars of sustainability. Solar panels were therefore featured during previous editions of the Innovation Day. Solar Sedum takes this to the next level by offering solar panels and a green roof in one. This is win-win, because in addition to generating renewable energy, the green roof simultaneously increases biodiversity and gradual water drainage, which then evaporates while at the same time removing heat. Consequence? The roof temperature becomes 30 degrees instead of 80 degrees on a hot summer day. And that makes solar panels more efficient at the same time. The double benefits seem endless when visitors hear that the shadow of the solar panels also has a positive effect on the green roof: it creates even more biodiversity.
Faster insulation
Prefab Insulation also knows the meaning of win-win. 300,000 homes in the Netherlands must be insulated on the inside by 2030. However, the news items about the pace of home insulation being far too slow are still coming thick and fast. Surely something can be done about, they thought at Presol, Bluedec. And what do you know, they succeeded. Toon pitched the new system, with one short visit to measure up being enough. No days of having a contractor in the house without it being habitable, just a measurement and then a ready-made package with all the insulation panels. The prefabricated system speeds up the pace of insulation by a hefty factor of 4. Not only for homes, but also for shops and commercial premises. A triple win? Owners comply with regulations faster, residents are less affected by nuisances such as dust and contractors can complete more jobs with the same number of FTEs.
Out of the box with Oyster Heaven
By far the most surprising pitch came from George. As a Brit based in Rotterdam, he is pioneering the use of bricks for healthier oceans. Too much of a long shot? This is where oysters, the construction industry and a good dose of creativity come together. Brick producers face many fluctuations in demand and production lines are sometimes at a standstill as a result. Oyster Heaven can stabilise this production by using the bricks as a base for oyster reefs. And this is much needed, because oysters consume nitrogen, absorb CO₂ and filter water. Pretty useful then, but they have largely disappeared from the oceans.
The bricks provide a base for baby oysters, which will grow on them and form 3D reefs. Over time, the bricks decay and we are left with only the strong oyster reefs. Genius, the audience thought. Visitor Joeri recounts: “This was definitely the best pitch today. Oyster Heaven knows how to harness the potential of extracting nitrogen from the air.” Oyster Heaven was therefore one of the four winners we will see again at the Green Buildings Event on 11 April 2024: Fagerhult, biocompact, RABLE and Oyster Heaven. Two names the participants in the Vissenkom hall had not yet heard about. Curious about the other eight pitchers? Check them out here.
That the CFP Innovation Day can give a boost to pitchers was clearly evident this year. Soluxa, a pitcher from last year, had proudly put up a banner. What could be seen on it? Their first successful project showing off the vertical solar panels in rust colour on the facades of Zwolle town hall.
