Housing as a strategy for the promotion of health from an intersectoral and multidisciplinary approach Erasmus Project

Project Title

Housing as a strategy for the promotion of health from an intersectoral and multidisciplinary approach

Project Key Action

This project related with these key action: Cooperation for innovation and the exchange of good practices

Project Action Type

This project related with this action type : Strategic Partnerships for higher education

Project Call Year

This project’s Call Year is 2019

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: New innovative curricula/educational methods/development of training courses; Inclusion – equity; Health and wellbeing

Project Summary

The BIMhealthy project will develop interoperability between the building and health sectors, to promote the establishment of healthy housing as a global model of habitat, in both environmental terms and public health promoter, by the integration of the emerging technologies of BIM (Building Information Modelling) as building design and control tools.

BACKGROUND
· Healthy housing:
Healthy housing is the concept of housing as a health agent, which implies reducing to the maximum the existing risk factors from its design, micro-localization and construction, extending then to its use and maintenance.
Numerous studies relate the quality of housing conditions to the quality of life or health of the resident, and without a doubt, there is a causal relationship between the environment and human health. Inadequate conditions of habitability, bring with them allergic pathologies and chemical components harmful to health. The impossibility of maintaining an adequate home temperature or energy poverty has been linked to high mortality and morbidity rates, mainly due to cardiovascular and respiratory diseases. Insufficient natural light, indoor air pollution, excessive external noise; they are a breeding ground for infectious, mental diseases, irritability, anxiety, depression and sleep disturbances. An inadequate physical and community environment accentuates the risk of suffering psychological and mental problems and even leads to higher death rates from all causes.
· Energy efficiency:
According to recent studies, Spain has a very poor residential park in terms of energy efficiency, due to its high age. Of 26 million Spanish houses, 15 are more than 30 years old and another six million were built more than half a century ago. This harsh energetic reality, coming to light with the processing of certificates of efficiency by some companies, yielding results Up to 43% of the labels processed, has resulted in the letter G, the lowest rating, while the 14% has obtained the F and 36.9% the E. Just 5% of the houses, achieves labels A, B, C or D.
An official estimate of the annual energy expenditure “necessary to guarantee an average level of comfort” according to the energy classification of the home reveals that while powering a house G costs 2,500 euros per year, to furnish a house A is 200 euros per year. A very significant saving if we take into account that the concept of healthy housing and therefore the health of the resident, is closely related to the socioeconomic level of the same. The lower the level, the more likely to live in worse housing conditions, and therefore, worse health.
· BIM:
The implementation of BIM in Europe is a reality already present. In northern Europe, the buildings in BIM are already conceptualized, built, managed and economically exploited. In Spain, the widespread use of BIM is still low, but it is a growing design resource, since the obligation to use BIM in public infrastructure projects for 2019 has been established.

OBJECTIVES
Therefore, BIMhealthy project will deepen the transversality of the healthy housing concept both in an educational level as well as for professional taking advantage of the knowledge flow of sanitary and building disciplines and will develop interoperability between metadata generated by the emerging technologies of BIM (Building Information Modelling), so that all information related to health and housing, can be flow into these systems and reinterpreted to exhaustive knowledge of urban developments and rehabilitation, so that the architect is trained to design a health promoter housing model.
In particular, and to contribute to the solution of the above described, the objectives of this project are the following:
– Promote and collaborate nationally and internationally in the dissemination of information and transfer of knowledge about the role of housing as an agent or manager of the health of its residents.
– Increase awareness of the relationship between housing and health in the most influential sectors of the construction sector.
– Sensitize the professional sectors by promoting active participation to include and maintain measures that favour health, considering the physical context of the constructive elements of the house.
– Use primary care as a working strength to promote a healthy housing environment through training on the environment and health, taking into account the intersectionality and multidisciplinary.
– Integrate BIM tools in all areas of the construction sector, such as methodologies that allow exhaustive control of the final energy efficiency of the housing project from the beginning of its design.
– Provide information and training to professionals in the health sector for the application of principles of healthy housing as a means of social inclusion.
– Provide information and training to professionals in the field of construction to acquire the ability to project housing as a health context.

Project Website

http://bimhealthy.eu/

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 267139 Eur

Project Coordinator

FUNDACION UNIVERSITARIA SAN ANTONIO & Country: ES

Project Partners

• UNIVERSITATEA TRANSILVANIA DIN BRASOV
• POLITECHNIKA WARSZAWSKA
• ASOCIACION EMPRESARIAL DE INVESTIGACION CENTRO TECNOLOGICO DEL MARMOL Y LA PIEDRA
• DATACOMP SPOLKA Z OGRANICZONA ODPOWIEDZIALNOSCIA
• Fundación de la Comunitat Valenciana para la Gestión del Instituto de Investigación Sanitaria y Biomédica de Alicante (ISABIAL)