Preface

Climate change, increasing energy demand and resource
scarcity
not only require a change in infrastructure and industry but also in
buildings and cities with smart technologies and systems.
Research
and innovation crucially contribute to sustainable and energy-efficient
buildings and cities. In the course of the research programme “Building
of tomorrow” in the last years my resort has supported many concepts and
key technologies for buildings. International co-operations made it
possible to successfully disseminate Austrian research results. Today
Austria plays an international pioneer role in energy-efficient
building. The new research programme „City of tomorrow“ aims to face
coming challenges by funding technological research and development
projects of systems and services for the city of the future.
I am
therefore very pleased to introduce here at the Sustainable Building
Conference 2013 this new research programme to an international audience
for the first time.
Dedicated to essential questions reaching from
renovating buildings and quarters to smart cities, the conference is an
excellent platform to present Austrian technologies and know-how in the
realms of buildings and cities.
With this in mind I wish those attending the international conference stimulant and exciting discussions!

Doris Bures
Bundesministerin
für Verkehr, Innovation und Technologie