The housing and climate crises are the most urgent challenges that Ireland and its citizens face. Despite significant increases in funding to tackle vacancies in recent years, vacancy rates remain high in Irish town and village centres, and “above the shop” spaces are often vacant or under-used.
Bringing back these properties into use through high-quality renovations represents a unique opportunity to address housing shortages, and make our city, town, and village centre more vibrant while supporting Ireland’s commitment to reduce its carbon emissions. High quality energy upgrades of these properties are key to cutting operational and embodied carbon emissions in the built environment. As people living in central locations are usually less reliant on cars, this would also reduce our fastest growing source of carbon emissions, transport. This approach is not only good for the environment, it is also good for people and the economy. For instance, it will enhance air quality, and contribute to restoring the cultural and aesthetic value of these areas.
The IGBC is working to unlock the potential of underused buildings through 2 initiatives.
Vacant to Viable
The “Vacant to Viable” project focuses on transforming Ireland’s underutilised building stock by researching perceived and actual regulatory barriers.
This project involves a desktop study and significant engagement with stakeholders to gather robust evidence regarding the impact of the Building Regulations and their associated Technical Guidance Documents (TGDs) on the re-use of buildings.
The aim is to unlock the potential of these underused buildings and support the government’s commitment to sustainable development and decarbonisation with a set of practical and implementable recommendations to be published by the end of 2025. If you are interested in getting involved, please get in touch with Joselyn.
The project is led by the Irish Green Building Council (IGBC) in partnership with University College Dublin (UCD) and funded by Construct Innovate.
Vacant to Vibrant Building Alliance
Vacant to Vibrant is a cross-sectoral forum that aims to positively influence public policy by bringing together all stakeholders to consider how we address the issues of vacancy, dereliction, and under-used buildings. This will include consideration of aspects that relate to finance, technical support, as well as awareness raising and education.
Guided by a Steering Group of leaders and experts in the field, the Vacant to Vibrant Alliance will meet monthly. The outcomes will be the presentation of evidence-based solutions to government, with an improved understanding among policymakers of key actions needed to bring vacant, derelict and under-used properties back into use.
The members of the Vacant to Vibrant Building Alliance (VVBA) are listed below:
- Philip Lee | Chair
- Pat Barry | CEO | Irish Green Building Council
- Fiona Craven | Programme Manager Adaptive Reuse | Dublin City Council
- Philip Crowe | Lecturer/Assistant Professor, School of Architecture, Planning and Environmental Policy | UCD
- Pat Davitt | CEO | Institute of Professional Auctioneers and Valuers
- Finbarr Filan | Vice-Chair | ISME
- Tom Gilligan | Director of Services | Mayo County Council
- Michael Hayes | Urban Planning Lead | Irish Green Building Council
- Ali Harvey | Associate Director | Jacobs
- Marion Jammet | Head of Policy & Advocacy | Irish Green Building Council
- Martin Markey | CEO | Hardware Association Ireland
- Martin McElligott | Town Centre Commercial Manager | Dundalk Business Improvement District (BID)
- Pranash Ramanundh | Practice Director | RIAI
- Edward Mc Auley | Director of Practice & Policy at Society of Chartered Surveyors of Ireland | SCSI
If you want to get more information, contact Marion.
This project is led by the Irish Green Building Council and funded through #BuildingLife by Laudes and IKEA Foundation.
