Freiburg im Breisgau is the youngest city in the state of Baden-Württemberg and lies within the Black Forest. Much of the city was destroyed in WWII, and it was rebuilt on its medieval grid. After the French occupation, the world-renowned district of Vauban modeled itself to be a sustainable district. Another notable modern district is Rieselfeld. In earlier times, Rieselfeld was acquired to build sewage farms and morphed into a place of social exclusion. Construction for the modern Rieselfeld began in 1994, and it has transformed into a model district with an abundance of Baugemeinschaften, affordable multi-family housing projects.
In the past, Freiburg remained an auto-oriented city, but throughout the years it has made strides towards multimodal transportation and sustainable design. The city has also greatly invested in renewable energies.
In more ways than one, Freiburg has been wildly successful in creating a vibrant, livable city with an impressive economy for a city of its size. One of the biggest economic and environmental boosters for Freiburg has been an embrace of the city's clean technology clusters. Clusters are concentrations of businesses that are all in the same type of work. In Freiburg, that is clean technology. Through the changes the city made decades ago and ones they make now, they have set an example that encouraged cleantech companies to move into their city.
Freiburg has long been an important voice in issues of city planning. In the 1970’s, the city used its authority to craft a policy that transformed an area in the middle of town from a parking space to a social space. Now, a daily Farmer’s Market is held in this city-center spot (in Altstadt, by the Munster Cathedral). They also promoted biking through transforming what used to be a car bridge into a bike and pedestrian bridge. Freiburg made a huge push against cars by limiting their accessibility in certain areas and providing quick, reliable alternative public transportation. The number of cars per 1,000 residents dropped between 1990 and 2006, whereas the rest of Germany rose significantly in terms of car ownership and the U.S. rose even more. If we were implementing policies like Freiburg and Germany in our cities, maybe we would see better results.
Freiburg has been successful in transforming the city into a model for a sustainable and livable city. Through forward thinking policies and good city planning, Freiburg has developed a multimodal city built for human scale. After much of Freiburg was bombed in WWII, planners had the vision to restore the cultural and historical feel of the city. Doing this put many regulations on buildings to preserve the historic look, while integrating pedestrian, cycling, and public transportation infrastructure. Furthermore, the city center become a traffic free zone for pedestrians. Closing streets to traffic encouraging citizens to use the alternative modes of transportation. This design helped to bring people back to the city center and make the zone a hub for social life. The traffic free city center was a great success for the city. It not only increased prosperity for local businesses, but it allowed the streetscape to become vibrant by serving as a central point for people to meet, socialize, and exchange ideas with one another. These functions of design help build a stronger social fabric within the city and make it a memorable experience for those who visit.
In 2000, Germany instated the Renewable Energy Sources Act requiring utilities to purchase renewables energy and pay a feed-in tariff to the energy supplier for 20 years. This had unforeseen success; over the next decade, solar, wind, geothermal, hydroelectric, and biogas renewable energy sources proliferated and have democratized the energy sector. In 2010, Germany implemented their energy transition concept, known as the Energiewende, a plan to a lower carbon emissions, become nuclear free, and provide an affordable and reliable energy supply. To achieve this plan, Germany set an ambitious goal of increasing renewable energy sources to 80% of gross electricity consumption. Today, Germany's energy scheme is still controlled by renewables; citizens and co-ops have retrofitted Freiburg with solar panels, wind turbines, water turbines, and Energie Plus homes to protect their environment and make a profit doing so. Other businesses in the area such as Sick, a sensor company, and Fraunhofer ISE are developing solutions for the energy grid to improve renewable integration, energy storage, efficiency, and new renewable technologies for the future.
Solar Panels
Solar panels, once expensive, have become increasingly cheaper prompting people to buy their own panels or participate in co-op community solar initiatives. During the day, the panels collect energy from the sun and the energy is sold to an energy provider. During the evening or when they need energy, these homes will buy energy back from that company. After the first 7-10 years, the solar panels will have been paid off and people begin profiting from their investment. With this system, solar panel owners have the ability to provide clean energy to the grid and profit from it later, making this an environmentally-friendly and sustainable form of energy generation. While the system has its pros, it is also incredibly inefficient in its nature that you must first sell energy to the grid only to buy it back later. With more advanced energy storage technology, people will be able to eliminate their integration to the grid entirely.
Wind Turbines
Wind turbines harness the power of wind to generate energy in an efficient and environmentally friendly way. Turbines can be financed by the government or people who participate in a co-op. Similar to solar, the energy generated by the wind turbine is sold to the energy grid and is later distributed back to the wind turbine owners. Using one of the world’s natural and sustainable resources (wind) to run an energy generator reduces carbon emissions, extraneous waste, and production costs.
Water Turbines
Water turbines can also be privately owned and follow the same method as solar panels and wind turbines of selling energy to the grid. In the village we visited, we saw two water power plants using the Archimedes screw method and a water pump to generate energy. Using the natural water features makes use of the already running stream and producing energy from a sustainable source.
Energie Plus Homes
Homes that are able to produce more energy than they consume are known as Energie Plus Homes. Vauban, a neighborhood of Freiburg, contained many of these futuristic homes which used a combination of advanced material science and passive housing techniques to minimize energy consumption for heating, cooling, and lighting. Producing more energy allows the owner to sell more back to the grid and make a larger profit while still being a zero-energy home.
SICK Sensors
SICK specializes in sensor production for all forms of industry. The use of sensor technology is a vital element in the smart city model to increase connectivity and improve quality of life. Sensors accomplish this through greater connectivity between devices, people, and their surroundings. Additionally, sensors also collect an enormous amount of data which is used to teach systems how to perform in more efficient ways. For example, a train card collects data on arrival times, number of people taking a train, the necessity of a certain train, amount of traffic, etc. This data can be used to inform systems of inefficient processes which if improved, will reduce energy costs, traffic, wait times, and more which leads to a better quality of life.
Fraunhofer ISE
The Fraunhofer Institute for Solar Energy Systems ISE is the largest solar energy research institute in Europe with subsidiaries and branches reaching all over the world. Fraunhofer ISE uses application-oriented research to develop energy efficient and environmentally friendly technologies. Institutes such as this one are important to the revitalization of Freiburg by bringing in an educated work force who will help revitalize the economy, but is also important for technology influencing the world and the future. These hubs of innovation, research, and technology are what drive the innovation of tomorrow using innovative thinking with fewer resources to solve our problems. Without institutions like this we would never progress and find new solutions to age-old and upcoming problems. The work done at Fraunhofer is not just to change Freiburg, but to change the course technology takes in the world and the future.
Green Space
When designing a city, green space is crucial. Rieselfeld is a great example of the smart use of green space integrated into housing communities where children can easily play and be exposed to nature. Rieselfeld incorporates many playgrounds in its surrounding area with equipment that imitates what one would find in a natural environment, like boulders and climbing trees. As one Rieselfeld mother commented, parents feel safe letting their kids run around. More freedom for kids outside the house helps engage them in more social as well as physical activity at a young age, and allows them more opportunities to test their abilities and discover the world for themselves. Exposure to green areas has also been shown to boost mental and overall physical health; experiments performed show that gallbladder surgery patients with a view of trees required less pain medication than those in a viewless room, and were released from the hospital ~1 day earlier than their counterparts. Additionally, green space has proved to be psychologically restoring and helps lower diastolic blood pressure. Vauban was designed on a regional scale where the district is linked to nature reserves in the vicinity, offering a quick getaway into a natural environment. Citizens also integrated plenty of green in the surrounding environment, leading to happier and healthier environments.
Social Housing
Redesigning in a way that accommodates diversity is proven to prevent isolation, create feelings of pride and self-importance, and connect communities of residents in a way that boosts public health. Vauban undertook converting barrack buildings into housing for the group Selbstorganisierte Unabhangige Siedluns-Initiative, or SUSI. SUSI, an alternative co-housing organization, was founded by a group of students, single parents and unemployed who together prevented the barrack buildings from being demolished and the converted the empty space into living for people with low incomes. Buildings are self-administered by the SUSI tenants, all resident members commit contributing 105 hours of self-help, and ownership is with SUSI members as well as a cooperative holding company which ensures the flats remain common property and will not be sold at a later stage. SUSI also runs a café, library, different workshops, and even joins with other projects to renovate further barrack buildings. Social housing communities are often unattractive and not integrated into the community. However, the efforts made in Vauban provide a living community that members are proud to live in. Additionally, blocks intended for housing were sold to small cooperatives of owner-occupiers. Cooperatives such as these were responsible for a detailed building design of their shared property that would accommodate all occupiers needs and desires for the plan, often pursuing environmental and social objectives. This caused incredible diversity in architectural and environmental solutions, a diversity in building types from single-family homes to 20-unit apartment buildings, and fostered “fruitful cooperation and common activities between future neighbors at an early stage, providing ample opportunity to build a robust and conflict-tested community along with the buildings.”
Transportation
Over the last three decades, the number of bicycle trips in Freiburg has tripled, public transport ridership has doubled, and the share of trips by automobile has declined from 38% to 32%. Furthermore, since 1990 per-capita CO2 emissions from transport have fallen despite both rapid population and economic growth. Freiburg’s main train station located near the city center offers secure, sheltered parking for 1,000 bikes, bike rental, repair, and shipment to other cities, and the station has expanded its network of public transit throughout the entire region of West Germany. Active travel has been advocated as one of the most feasible and affordable ways to get in the necessary physical activity. With obesity continuously on the rise, Freiburg has a leg up on a way to stay physically healthy. Additionally, active travel adopted by elderly generations aids with mobility and independence in later years, potentially contributing to Germany’s increased healthy life expectancy. Finally, such effective walk, cycle, and public transit infrastructures gets more cars off the road (only 3.5 out of 10 people in Freiburg own cars) which helps decrease CO2 and air pollution, which are associated with many respiratory and cardiovascular ailments.