11 Real-World Laboratories Initiated by Practitioner …
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members of the association explicitly represent the interests of the association and
of the regional stakeholders it represents. As a result, the focus is on searching for
workable approaches for promoting sustainable development by using renewable
energies and achieving high resource efficiency. Considering contributions from the
current scientific real-world laboratory debate, this regional institution could also be
characterised as a “real-world laboratory as a whole” [own translation] (Beecroft et al.
2018: 80) where various transdisciplinary sustainability projects are implemented.
The joint research project entitled “The re-productive town”, which has received
BMBF funding for three years, is one of the outcomes of EAA’s activities in the Anhalt
region. Initiated by EAA, the research alliance comprises EAA and Bitterfeld-Wolfen
Town Council as its practice partners, and Brandenburg University of Technology
(BTU) Cottbus-Senftenberg/Chair of Urban Technical Infrastructure, the Fraunhofer
Institute for Microstructure of Materials and Systems (IMWS) and inter 3 Institute
for Resource Management as its science partners. The project is accompanied scientifically by sustainify Institut für nachhaltige Forschung, Bildung, Innovation. In
the research project, the town of Bitterfeld-Wolfen is taken as an example of the
urban planning challenges associated with transformation. This town seems to be
particularly suited to develop and test new approaches for social-ecological urban
development. The starting point of the project is the energy sector, from which inroads
are made into agriculture and forestry, architecture and building services, industry
and finance, citizenry, the urban economy and the urban landscape. Possibilities are
systematically sought to consider unexploited resources such as brownfield sites, sun,
wind and green waste as well as secondary resources such as waste heat and refuse
as a starting point for something new. These innovations are then reutilised for the
benefit of the town and its inhabitants or the processes that generate them are directly
changed. Conceptually, the approach refers back to the concept of (re)productivity
proposed by Biesecker and Hofmeister (2006). According to this concept, (urban)
production and consumption processes must be designed in such a way that the town
maintains or even improves its material/energy and economic/social reproductive
capability in order to remain sustainable or to ensure its long-term survival. The aim is
to use the systematic improvement of the material/energy and economic/social reproductive capability of Bitterfeld-Wolfen Town to develop a blueprint for a possible
transformation path for a new, yet very common type of town as a result of territorial reforms: an extensive, medium-sized, polycentric town that can be expected to
offer new starting points for energy and sustainability transition and, as a result, new
townscapes and urban landscapes.
Urban laboratories are a core format. Urban laboratories are site-specific
participatory and communication platforms that map ongoing local transformation processes and enable broad participation. They provide the experimental basis
for developing, negotiating and implementing into urban design solutions for the
use of secondary resources in urban spaces in cooperation with the population,
companies and the administration. This is undertaken in work phases of living
labs or real-world laboratories such as co-design, co-creation, co-exploration, coexperimentation/testing and co-evaluation steps. More specifically, four urban laboratories representing neighbourhoods typical of medium-sized towns were selected
211
members of the association explicitly represent the interests of the association and
of the regional stakeholders it represents. As a result, the focus is on searching for
workable approaches for promoting sustainable development by using renewable
energies and achieving high resource efficiency. Considering contributions from the
current scientific real-world laboratory debate, this regional institution could also be
characterised as a “real-world laboratory as a whole” [own translation] (Beecroft et al.
2018: 80) where various transdisciplinary sustainability projects are implemented.
The joint research project entitled “The re-productive town”, which has received
BMBF funding for three years, is one of the outcomes of EAA’s activities in the Anhalt
region. Initiated by EAA, the research alliance comprises EAA and Bitterfeld-Wolfen
Town Council as its practice partners, and Brandenburg University of Technology
(BTU) Cottbus-Senftenberg/Chair of Urban Technical Infrastructure, the Fraunhofer
Institute for Microstructure of Materials and Systems (IMWS) and inter 3 Institute
for Resource Management as its science partners. The project is accompanied scientifically by sustainify Institut für nachhaltige Forschung, Bildung, Innovation. In
the research project, the town of Bitterfeld-Wolfen is taken as an example of the
urban planning challenges associated with transformation. This town seems to be
particularly suited to develop and test new approaches for social-ecological urban
development. The starting point of the project is the energy sector, from which inroads
are made into agriculture and forestry, architecture and building services, industry
and finance, citizenry, the urban economy and the urban landscape. Possibilities are
systematically sought to consider unexploited resources such as brownfield sites, sun,
wind and green waste as well as secondary resources such as waste heat and refuse
as a starting point for something new. These innovations are then reutilised for the
benefit of the town and its inhabitants or the processes that generate them are directly
changed. Conceptually, the approach refers back to the concept of (re)productivity
proposed by Biesecker and Hofmeister (2006). According to this concept, (urban)
production and consumption processes must be designed in such a way that the town
maintains or even improves its material/energy and economic/social reproductive
capability in order to remain sustainable or to ensure its long-term survival. The aim is
to use the systematic improvement of the material/energy and economic/social reproductive capability of Bitterfeld-Wolfen Town to develop a blueprint for a possible
transformation path for a new, yet very common type of town as a result of territorial reforms: an extensive, medium-sized, polycentric town that can be expected to
offer new starting points for energy and sustainability transition and, as a result, new
townscapes and urban landscapes.
Urban laboratories are a core format. Urban laboratories are site-specific
participatory and communication platforms that map ongoing local transformation processes and enable broad participation. They provide the experimental basis
for developing, negotiating and implementing into urban design solutions for the
use of secondary resources in urban spaces in cooperation with the population,
companies and the administration. This is undertaken in work phases of living
labs or real-world laboratories such as co-design, co-creation, co-exploration, coexperimentation/testing and co-evaluation steps. More specifically, four urban laboratories representing neighbourhoods typical of medium-sized towns were selected