Curatorial statement

In the midst of the crisis of climate change↗, nature and biodiversity loss↗, pollution and waste↗, we must acknowledge that Europe’s built environment needs to reduce more than 95% of its carbon footprint by the 2030 to avoid climate breakdown↗. At a time when many countries face a housing crisis and retrofitting the building stock is essential to reduce energy use, we must also address the embodied carbon and other environmental harm of ‘construction as usual.’

Currently European carbon reduction rates achieve only roughly 10% of the actually required carbon reduction rates ↗, mostly focused on unaffordable technological innovation with undesirable rebound effects↗. How do we achieve the missing reductions at the speed, scale and affordability needed - whilst ensuring people have access to beautiful and affordable places to live, work and thrive? How do we then go further in making sure our built environment becomes carbon negative, actively supporting the recovery of nature?

Material extraction is the main driver of this crisis↗, the construction sector being responsible for its 50%↗ while our economic models only accelerate the extraction of materials, energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions↗. This is especially relevant for Romania, which is together with Denmark at the top of European material footprint increase in Europe↗. How do we dematerialise the economy of our built environment whilst improving people’s access to good housing in the midst of a chronic cost-of-living crisis? What opportunities might this hold for Bucharest and all of Romania?

Our current green transition isn’t going well: Circularity, vital for meeting climate targets, is very low and in decline↗. Renewable energy systems installation is growing rapidly but globally we are not seeing energy transition but energy addition: we still get 80% of our energy needs from fossil fuels, roughly the same as in 1970↗.In Europe, the share of renewables for all energy use has crept up to 23% - we’re still behind target↗. We need to address carbon consumption head on.

Europe’s built environment sector - including construction - is responsible for over 36% of its greenhouse gases↗. We underutilise vast amounts of our buildings↗, yet we continue to build new. We don’t account for systemic impacts of the “green” solutions↗ , leaving spaces for greenwashing and unvalidated claims↗. Most built environment solutions are too expensive and too inefficient. How do we systematically re-evaluate our targets? How do we transcend the usual innovation models and shift our innovation spaces?

Some of the new economic spaces in this new reality are maximising utilisation of the existing building stock instead of building new, new building typologies and use models, sharing and flexible space use, city-scale circularity schemes, local biomaterial forests, new standards of comfort, new aesthetics, shifts in values, care models and other innovation spaces yet to discover.

This initiative invites actors willing to step beyond the current pathways into new innovation spaces of deep transformation. How can Bucharest use this opportunity to showcase to Europe some of the new generation of carbon reduction pathways? How will it forge new approaches and value chains, building on the creativity and drive of its people together with innovators from all over the world?

About Dark Matter Labs

Around the planet, we’re feeling the consequences of outdated institutions and inadequate infrastructures incapable of coping with planetary-scale challenges. Dark Matter Labs↗ is a non-profit taking on these challenges by working on what is needed to manifest transformations to our systems; the underlying ‘dark matter’ - monetary, economic, governance, regulatory, policy, accountancy, insurance and other systems.

Dark Matter Labs is actively involved in the EU Mission for 100 Climate Neutral Cities by 2030↗ and the New European Bauhaus↗. It also collaborates with numerous cities, philanthropies, and other organisations to accelerate the transition towards a regenerative and just future.