15 July 2024 News Built Environment

Laudes Foundation seeks to seed national/regional consortia to develop solutions for providing affordable housing within planetary boundaries

Laudes Foundation seeks to seed national/regional consortia to develop solutions for providing affordable housing within planetary boundaries in their respective countries. Focus countries for proposals are France, Germany, Netherlands, Spain, and the United Kingdom. Complete proposals must be submitted via email by Friday August 23 2024 (end of day) to Alice Haugh, Senior Programme Manager, Built Environment: a.haugh@laudesfoundation.org. Please note we will not accept applications from individual organisations who wish to act on this agenda on their own. 

Introduction
Laudes Foundation is an independent foundation joining the growing movement to accelerate the transition to a climate-positive and inclusive global economy. Responding to the challenge of a just transition, Laudes supports brave action that inspires and challenges industry to harness its power for good. Founded by the Brenninkmeijer family business owners, it builds on six generations of entrepreneurship and philanthropy and works collaboratively alongside a wide network of philanthropic organisations, to both influence finance and capital markets and transform industry with a focus on the built environment and fashion sectors. 

This Request for grant Proposals (RfP) comes from Laudes Foundation’s Built Environment and Gender Equity and Social Inclusion programmes, where our focus on just transitions means we support agency, inclusion and accountability for residents and workers in the climate transition of Europe’s built environment. Our intention with this RFP is to catalyse new collaborations between climate and social inequality organisations focused on housing. We therefore invite national/regional consortia in focus countries to come together to identify solutions – across industry, finance, policy, media and community levers – which reorient the housing industry towards ensuring climate targets for the sector are met in a just and inclusive way that ensures fulfilment of housing needs. Laudes Foundation is specifically looking for low carbon housing solutions that are addressing impacts on residents - particularly around affordability. Therefore, proposals that do not consider decarbonisation will be out of scope.
 
Context
Climate
To deliver a just transition of Europe’s built environment, we must address residential buildings, which comprise 75% of Europe’s total building stock, consume 22% of global energy and contribute 22 – 25% of global greenhouse gas emissions (17% from operational carbon and between 5 – 8% from embodied carbon). Transitioning to net-zero buildings necessitates strategic use of policy and financial tools. The focus of both global and European building decarbonisation policy and industry action to date has been on reducing energy use (operational carbon). Investments into buildings highlight this prioritisation – while across the EU27 EUR 85 - 90 billion is invested annually into energy efficiency measures for buildings, EUR 700 billion is invested into the construction of new buildings. This is reflected in the fact that, on average, Europe is becoming less dense as suburban sprawl has become the preferred pattern for new residential construction.  

However, as energy grids start to decarbonise and energy efficiency measures see increasing investment across Europe, the relative importance of reducing embodied carbon is growing. Mitigating these emissions will be key to meeting climate targets. In recognition of this fact, in 2024 the European Union revised its Energy Performance of Buildings Directive (EPBD) to reduce both operational and embodied carbon in the EU’s building stock. The revised EPBD requires lifecycle Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emissions to be calculated and disclosed through an Energy Performance Certificate (EPC) for all new buildings across Member States from 2030. In addition, Member States will have to adopt national roadmaps and set targets to reduce such lifecycle emissions – moving towards setting limits on all new build by 2030. 

Social
With residential buildings making up 75% of Europe’s building stock, a key group impacted by decarbonisation is the residents who live in those homes and in particular, the 70 million people in Europe who are overburdened by housing costs. Across Europe today, the cost of decarbonisation risks compounding existing inequalities in access to and affordability of housing. On average, house prices in European cities increased by 48% between 2010 and 2022, whilst salaries have increased by just 17%. At least 895,000 people are homeless  and the growing gap between housing costs and salaries is fuelling protests and ensuring housing remains a top issue in recent national elections, including in the Netherlands  and Germany. Real estate businesses are expressing concern that residents can no longer afford the housing they are supplying. In 2023 housing affordability was reported as the ‘top short-term operational challenge for the market’ by investors  as well as one of the top five themes driving real estate investment decisions by businesses in the sector. 

Against this backdrop, the standard response from governments and industry is to set new home building targets as the solution e.g. 300,000 per year in the UK; 100,000 per year in the Netherlands; 400,000 per year in Germany.  Yet this potentially misdiagnoses the problem, as there is little evidence that a scarcity of supply is causing unaffordability – in countries like the UK, there has never been more supply per capita than today. Economic factors including the availability of cheap mortgage credit, quantitative easing and fiscal benefits for home-buyers tend to be overlooked, along with the shrinking of welfare states across Europe which has incentivised home-owners to increase the size of their homes to hedge against retirement without state pensions and support. 

Aside from evidence that increasing supply is unlikely to reduce house prices, the embodied carbon involved in new construction means that delivering national house-building targets would use up EU nations’ entire remaining carbon budgets on housing alone between now and 2050, leaving nothing left over for the rest of their economies. In fact, it has been estimated that the maximum number of new homes that can be built within the carbon budget per year for the whole of Europe would be around 176,000. This issue is simply not being discussed, but we believe there are common sense solutions that should be on the table that represent the coming together of climate and social innovation.  

To date there has been significant eco-backlash against building decarbonisation policy in Europe, including the EU’s Energy Performance of Buildings Directive, with representatives of impacted groups pointing out that the cost of reducing operational carbon must not fall on those least able to pay. With embodied carbon limits coming into force in the EU under the revised EPBD over the coming years, we anticipate significant eco-backlash against measures to reduce new construction, which may be perceived as contributing to growing unaffordability. To avoid that scenario unfolding, there is an urgent need to shift the narrative around why housing is unaffordable away from a tunnel vision focus on supply and demand, and to implement practical pathways to fulfilling housing need without overshooting planetary boundaries. 

Purpose and scope
Laudes’ intention in launching this RFP is to seed national/regional coalitions in countries in Europe where housing need and carbon emissions from construction are both high, annual house building targets are set, and resolving the conflict between housing need and carbon emissions is therefore urgent: France, Germany, the Netherlands, Spain and the United Kingdom. We are seeking proposals from consortia of organisations in each country who are motivated and able to implement viable solutions to a critical just transition dilemma for the built environment: Given limited carbon budgets and the increasing unaffordability of housing, how do we provide affordable housing within planetary boundaries in [France, Germany, the Netherlands, Spain or the UK]? 

To accurately assess the situation in each country, it will be crucial to distinguish between housing need and want – even though these terms are often used interchangeably today.
•    Housing need refers to ensuring adequate housing for everyone. Adequacy, as defined under international law, includes tenure security, quality, affordability, and suitability to the household. Satisfying housing need would mean ensuring that everyone is able to afford and keep a decent home. 
•    Housing demand is broader than housing need and includes housing “wants” i.e. consumers’ desire to purchase housing. This is driven by a broad range of motivations that go beyond satisfying basic needs (investment, speculation, increased comfort and space, desirability of a particular location etc). 

To balance the need to decarbonise with social inclusion in residential real estate, reorienting industry activity away from satisfying total potential housing demand towards satisfying real housing need will be critical. This will ensure that Europe’s remaining carbon budget is used to the best of its ability for human well-being. 

Laudes therefore wants to support brave action to challenge and inspire the construction industry to be a force for good. With this RFP we challenge the field to co-create innovative and context-specific approaches to solving the above dilemma in practical and implementable ways. Hence, the scope of work is expected to include some of the following in each national context, but we are open to receiving alternative methodologies which meet the objectives of the RFP. 

1.    Assessment of the extent to which national house building targets are based on housing need vs housing want. 
2.    Assessment of the environmental impact (carbon emissions, material demand and biodiversity loss) and social impact (affordability, accessibility) of fulfilling national house building targets / housing want according to business as usual construction practices. A stakeholder mapping at this stage is encouraged, in order to identify who will be impacted and in what way. 
3.    Identification / implementation of tactics to reorient housing want towards housing need e.g. finance and policy incentives.
4.    Identification / implementation of tactics to achieve housing need within planetary boundaries over the coming years including which actors (e.g. policymakers, investors, project developers, residents / tenants) are responsible for implementing what, based on a power analysis. It is anticipated that these tactics will combine industry, policy and/or financial innovation. 
5.    Prioritisation of tactics based on assessment of the environmental and social impact of each tactic: which one(s) offer the most positive social and environmental benefits? 
6.    A roadmap for implementing tactics over the coming years, assigning responsibility to actors responsible for implementing, and describing at what scale (city, region, national) implementation will occur. 

Critically, all steps and proposed tactics must take consideration of socio-economic factors in addition to environmental. In particular, the question of affordability  must be foregrounded. We are seeking creativity and innovation because we anticipate that the most impactful tactics may emerge from sectors which may at first appear unrelated to housing, including economic and welfare policy. 

Budget: We have a budget of EUR 650,000 – 700,000 in total for this work. We anticipate being able to cover at least 2 and no more than 3 national coalitions with this funding (i.e. single country proposals for the entire budget are unlikely to be successful), in addition to the umbrella organisation. Hence, expected breakdown of budget is expected to be:
•    For 2 national coalitions: EUR 250,000 for each national coalition + 150,000 for an umbrella organisation.
•    For 3 national coalitions: EUR 200,000 for each national coalition + 100,000 for an umbrella orgnisation.
Depending on results, further follow-up funding may be made available in subsequent years.

Submission deadline: Friday August 23rd (end of day)

Expected timeframe
•    Wednesday July 15th: Laudes publishes RFP
•    Friday August 23rd: Deadline for submissions 
•    Wednesday August 28th: Interviews
•    Monday September 2nd: Consortia selected 

Consortia profile
Our preference is for one pan-European lead organisation to come forward who can co-ordinate efforts and share solutions across the national/regional consortia. This is a preference but not a strict need – and national/regional consortia can come forward with proposals individually. We will not accept applications from individual organisations who wish to act on this agenda on their own. 

To ensure that this work is implementation focused, each national consortia should consist of the actors who will need to implement change on the ground as a result of this work. We therefore seek to support diverse, multi-stakeholder consortia to include, but not limited to: 

•    City, regional, and/or national public authorities*
•    Construction clients, project developers and/or investors
•    Resident / tenants advocates / community-led organisations 
•    Sustainability consultants / academics 
•    Media / campaigns experts

* Whilst Laudes funding cannot be used to fund public authorities directly, we encourage their participation in national/regional coalitions through in-kind hours.

We encourage applications organisations that we are not (yet) aware of and Laudes partner organisations. We are particularly keen to build on existing networks that are already active on this agenda in their respective countries, as well as to encourage new and novel partnership across climate and social spheres. Preference will be given to consortia which demonstrate knowledge and experience in advancing gender equity and social inclusion (GESI) for the purpose of advancing inclusion in the built environment. 

Proposal requirements and budget

1.      A narrative proposal using Laudes Foundation’s proposal template which includes approach and methodology. Please submit a Word doc not PDF. An explanation of rubrics can be found here – suggested rubrics for this work are Category A (all A rubrics A1 – A5 must be included); B rubrics (we suggest to select B1, B3 and B6). In addition please provide: bios/CVs with specific expertise and relevant experience of consortium members and lead umbrella organisation, as well as a timeline of activities (duration of the work to be defined by the consortium but we estimate +/-2 years).

2.      A financial proposal should include a line-item budget using Laudes Foundation’s budget template. The cost estimates used to prepare the budget should be presented in Euros. Laudes has a total budget of EUR 650,000 – 700,000 in total for 2-3 national/regional coalitions plus umbrella organisation combined. 

 

Annex

Laudes is aware of the following studies which start to explore the dilemma outlined in this RFP. This list is not exhaustive, and by opening up a public Request for Proposals, we hope to learn of much more action taking place across Europe on this agenda:

·         Actieagenda Wonen, Platform Woonopgave, Netherlands

·         Woningbouw binnen planetaire grenzen, Copper8, Metabolic, Nibe, Alba, Netherlands

·         A home for all within planetary boundaries, Universities of Kent, Bath, Cambridge, Leeds, Surrey, Exeter, University College London, United Kingdom

·         Meeting housing needs within planetary boundaries requires opening the black box of housing “demand”, University College London, United Kingdom

·         Climate neutrality, Energy security and Sustainability: A pathway to bridge the gap through Sufficiency, Efficiency and Renewables, négaWatt Association, France