SustainaBul Best Practice award for project Inside Out

The Utrecht region scores well in the SustainaBul 2020, the ranking list of sustainable higher education institutes in the Netherlands by Studenten van Morgen. Utrecht University (UU) took sixth place, Utrecht University of Applied Sciences (HU) scored fourth place and Utrecht's Inside Out project won the SustainaBul Best Practice award. In this project, Bo-Ex, UU, HU and innovation partners are realising the first positive energy high-rise apartment building in Europe, led by the Utrecht Sustainability Institute.

Een heiskraan plaatst een raamgevel op een flat
Next phase of Inside Out: placing the first facades at high-rise apartment building in Utrecht. Photo: Utrecht Sustainability Institute.

Inside Out as best practice

Well-submitted by the HU, the Inside Out project won the SustainaBul award for Best Practice for making a 10-storey apartment in the Utrecht neighbourhood of Overvecht more sustainable. Thanks to Inside Out, the apartment complex on the Henriëttedreef will become a positive energy building. The Inside Out renovation system combines multifunctional, modular building components and can be applied to comparable high-rise apartments in the future. For example: a smart facade that heats and ventilates homes, and provides sustainable electricity. The broad cooperation leads to the first positive energy high-rise apartment building in Europe, and contributes to the energy transition.

Broad collaboration

Inside Out is carried out with Top Sector Energy Subsidy of the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Climate. Partners are Utrecht Sustainability Institute, UU, HU, Bo-Ex housing corporation, Bos Installatiewerken, Alkondor Hengelo, Mex Architects, LomboXnet and Bosch Thermotechniek. Thanks to this collaboration, the concept of Inside Out was able to be developed and applied in practice. The partners installed the first new facades on June 8, 2020, an important milestone for the application of Inside Out to the entire apartment building.

Logo van het Inside Out Project
Inside Out project logo.

Sustainable region

With the SustainaBul, Studenten van Morgen tests the thirty largest higher education institutes in the Netherlands for their sustainability. With fourth and sixth places for HU and UU, higher education in the Utrecht region scores particularly high on sustainability. This is reflected, among other things, in the many sustainability projects in the region, such as Inside Out.