Yesterday, 26 professionals involved in sustainable construction met at a conference organised as part of the BUILD UP Skills project 'Construye 2030', co-funded by the LIFE Clean Energy Transition programme of the European Commission, at the Instituto Eduardo Torroja de Ciencias de la Construcción del CSIC (IETcc-CSIC) to discuss the current barriers to achieving Europe's energy goals.

The day started with the second project meeting, in which the partners worked on the progress of the first output, the Status Quo of the building sector, and on the training needs throughout the value chain of the sector, which are essential to achieve the energy performance of buildings, urban sustainability and contribute to the goals of the 2030 Agenda.

This document will contribute to the definition of a Roadmap which will include a set of priority measures aimed at enabling certain construction professions to perform their tasks in a sustainable manner, as well as to re-skill workers from highly polluting activities (such as the mining industry), and to attract young people and women to the sector.

Workshop on the challenges of the construction sector

After the meeting, the first endorsement seminar of the project was held with the participation of different professionals from key entities of the sector, among them: Positivelivings; the General Council of Technical Architecture (Consejo General de la Arquitectura Técnica, CGATE); the Association of Real Estate Developers of Madrid (Asociación Promotores Inmobiliarios de Madrid, ASPRIMA); BMI Group Spain; the Building Cluster; Saint Gobain Isover y Placo; the Construction Institute of Castilla y León; the Centre for Energy, Environmental and Technological Research; the Offsite Construction Hub (OCH); CRN en Edificación y Obra Civil; the Spanish Institute of Cement and its Applications; and the Ministry for Ecological Transition and the Demographic Challenge.

After a brief presentation of the project, the partners presented the BUILD UP Skills initiative in Spain from its beginning in 2011 to the current 'Construye 2030' and invited the participants to divide into four working groups to address the barriers to achieving the energy goals of the 2030 Agenda, based on four aspects (which coincided with the roundtable discussions): economic, administrative, structural and cultural/educational.

An interesting debate that will help to complement the analysis of the Status Quo of the sector and to set the objectives of the Roadmap.

The experts participating in the workshop will also be able to participate in the National Qualification Platform, which constitutes a reference space on training issues for the construction sector and which aims to bring together as many professionals as possible to create a virtual working environment to address the immediate and future challenges of the industry.

'Construye 2030': the construction sector towards 2030

'Construye 2030' is coordinated by Fundación Laboral de la Construcción and has an key partnership in the field of construction training: Confederación Nacional de la Construcción (CNC), Comisiones Obreras del Hábitat (CCOO del Hábitat)?, Federación de Industria, Construcción y Agro de la Unión General de Trabajadores (UGT-FICA), Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas (CSIC), Green Building Council España (GBCe) and Fundación Estatal para la Formación en el Empleo (Fundae).

Co-funded by the European Union. Views and opinions expressed are however those of the author(s) only and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Union or CINEA. Neither the European Union nor the granting authority can be held responsible for them.