The O-HB team presented the results of the laboratory on the physical condition and potential for improvement of Barcelona’s housing stock in a workshop dedicated to energy efficiency and environmental sustainability of housing. The presentation, by Alba Alsina, Aleix Arcarons and Mireia Sender, highlighted that Barcelona has a residential park with a high potential for energy improvement, and that renovations actions with passive strategies would contribute to significantly reduce their primary energy consumption.

The director of the O-HB has intervened in two of the workshops of the Barcelona ENHR 2022 congress with a paper on the role of housing observatories in Europe and another on the residential exclusion of women in Spain. The debate revealed the existence of a growing number of housing observatories in Europe at all levels, and reviewed the current obstacles and challenges they face in aspects such as housing data, monitoring and evaluation of sectoral policies, or housing governance.

Barcelona is hosting the annual congress of the European Network for Housing Research (ENHR), one of the world’s most important gatherings of housing researchers. This congress, from August 30 to September 2, has been organized by Barcelona City Council and the ENHR itself, with the collaboration of the O-HB, among other organizations. This year it focuses on the struggle for the right to housing, the pressures of globalisation and affordability in cities today.