CAVIAR UPV/EHU “Quality of Life in Architecture” research group is composed of teaching and research staff from the Architecture Department of the University of the Basque Country (UPV/EHU). It was established in 2006, supported by the structure of the new Master’s programme in “Sustainable Construction and Energy Efficiency”, which was launched in collaboration with the Environmental Resource Centre “Cristina Enea” (San Sebastián City Council). In 2015, it was recognised for the first time as an Integrated Group in the Basque Research System by the Basque Government.
The group addresses, from the field of Architecture, one of the EU’s priorities and distinctive areas, as included in the European Construction Technology Platform (ECTP): Quality of Life. It places particular emphasis on the social responsibility of the actors involved in the creative-constructive process and on the need to foster an interactive dialogue with users. Thus, human perception is brought back to the forefront of development and research activities. For this reason, the research areas of the group are connected through three cross-cutting focus areas related to people, the environment and efficient management. To facilitate internal organisation, the group’s research projects are categorised into different lines of investigation, which are currently as follows:
L1: Quality of Life, Health and well-being, Comfort, Human-built environment interaction, Renaturalization.
L2: Sustainability, Climate neutrality, Energy efficiency, Circular economy, Life cycle, Industrialization.
L3: Regeneration and Urban Transitions: mobility and technologies for increasing capacities, urban renewable electricity.
The construction processes and the methods of management and intervention in the urban territory, which constitute the material object of our research, have a significant impact on the environment, the conservation of natural resource, the preservation of ecosystems, the city, and the quality of life of all its inhabitants. The concept of sustainability must be adapted to people’s needs, in the pursuit of continuous improvement of their quality of life.
