New townhall – Kiruna
Implementation concept submitted by: Nenet
Region: Norrbotten, Sweden
Type of building
Kind of public use: Town hall
Total effective area: not yet defined, but not more than 9.700 m2 in total.
Number of levels above earth: not yet defined, probably 2
Source of energy for heating: Not defined yet, district heating is possible
Owner and costs
Name of owner: City of Kiruna, building authority: LKAB mining company
Date of construction: 2015-2016
Total cost: max 250 Mio SEK
Financing resources: City of Kiruna, Mining company LKAB
Short description of the pilot project
The new Kiruna Town Hall is a lighthouse project within the comprehensive city transformation due to extended mining areas. In the coming 20-25 years, the mining will affect approximately 2 500 apartments as well as approximately 200 000 square meters of commercial, office, school and health care premises.
Based on MountEE criteria for pilot projects, the call for bids for the Town Hall included as targets and criteria in terms of sustainability:
– Recycling of parts of the old City Hall
– Target level: at least -50% reduced energy demand compared to building code
– Low CO2 emissions calculated for the whole lifecycle
– Matching criteria for Swedish Green Building Council’s Miljöbyggnad
– Use of environmental-friendly building materials according to Sunda Hus criteria
The City of Kiruna aims at becoming a sustainable city taking care of all dimensions of sustainability. Due to the harsh mountain climate, energy efficient buildings are an important part in that. The Town Hall will be a meeting point for citizens as well as the place for decision making, and it shall – like the former Town Hall – become a national recognized example for Northern sustainable building architecture.
So far, there are few examples for highly energy efficient public buildings in the County of Norrbotten. The Town Hall will contribute substantially to a better understanding of technical questions, it will also be a highly visible example made to raise awareness.
Quality of location and facilities
The project to build a new Town Hall in Kiruna is part of a comprehensive city transformation due to extended mining. The process of deciding where the new Kiruna will be built and developing urban land-use planning is ongoing. A sustainable transportation concept is under development. This makes that no information are available so far on how the Town Hall will be connected in terms of public transport etc.
Process and planning quality
a) Decision making and determination of goals
In 2004, the governmentally owned mining company LKAB sent a letter to Kiruna municipality asking for changes in the land-use plan due to the effects the expansion of their mining activity would have on the ground underneath the city. Since then, the City of Kiruna is together with LKAB working on making the city transformation happen. The Town Hall is one of the first buildings which will be replaced. Responsibility for this project is split between the City and LKAB depending on which phase is happing. The City of Kiruna is responsible for the architecture competition, while LKAB will be the builder. After this, the building will be owned by the City.
Nenet, Norrbotten Energy Agency, is owned by all municipalities in Norrbotten County, thus also by the City of Kiruna. Based on consultancy of Nenet’s MountEE project staff, environmental and energy criteria were developed as an important part of the competition. Different variants in respect to energy efficiency, ecological use of material had been already discusses in the MountEE regional committee, results have been used for designing the competition.
b) Objectives for energetic measures
– Recycling of parts of the old City Hall
– Target level: at least -50% reduced energy demand compared to standard
– Low CO2 emissions calculated for the whole lifecycle
– Matching criteria for Swedish Green Building Council’s Miljöbyggnad, which include even criteria for indoor environment, materials and chemicals
– Use of environmental-friendly building materials according to Sunda Hus criteria
c) Standardized calculation of economic efficiency
The architecture competition demands that lifecycle costs have to be accounted, but defines no specific method.
d) Product management – use of low emission products
– Matching criteria for Swedish Green Building Council’s Miljöbyggnad, which include even criteria for indoor environment, materials and chemicals
– Use of environmental-friendly building materials according to Sunda Hus criteria
Leading questions:
Ecological optimization of materials during planning and tendering will follow the Swedish Green Building Council regulation, and all materials will be checked against a national database on ecological building materials. Results will be documented, no methodology defined yet.
e) Planning support for energetic optimization
The completion defines clear goals and even methodology according to Swedish Green Building Council. However, as there is no decision yet on a concrete proposal, there are no concrete space allocation plans and similar yet, nor is there a final definition of the working structure. It will be part of the further consultancy within MountEE project to ensure a proper realization of plans to reach the defined energy targets.
f) Information for users
As the project is still in a planning phase with a variety of proposals no final decision on information of users yet.
Implementation of service package
The following parts of the Service Package will be used
– Optimization of planning, tendering, monitoring offers, LCC etc.
– Realization: support of craftsmen, material control, product declaration
– Control of success
– Service and maintainance
How the Service Package in general can be transferred to Sweden is part of the ongoing MountEE work and still under investigation. The application of the method to the actual pilot building will be updated according to the general Swedish approach.
Energy and Utilities
a) Specific heating and hot water demand
– Target level: at least -50% reduced energy demand compared to building code
– Details on realization depend on which proposal will be chosen.
d) Renewable energy
Not defined yet. Defined values for energy are:
– at least -50% reduced energy demand compared to building code
– Heating power requirement: < 40W/m2 heated area
– Solar heat load <43 W/ m2 floor area
– Renewable energies: >50% bioenergy and less than >25% fossile or nuclear energy.
e) Renewable energy
Connection to the municipal district heating is possible, but if this will be the case is not decided yet. Other use of renewable energy depends on which proposal is winning, not decided yet beyond energy targets see above.
Building materials and constructions
The City of Kiruna is aiming at realizing a truly sustainable building. This includes all dimensions of sustainability, and the already mentioned criteria are part of the architecture competition, but none proposal is chosen yet. Therefore, no more details are available.
Evaluation and follow up
Support for pilot:
1) Sharing information with City of Kiruna and LKAB building teams, e.g. from WP2 Best Practice examples;
2) Facilitating continuously exchange of information with MountEE Regional Cooperation Committee;
3) Capacity building for municipal staff, building company and project leaders following concrete demands from the pilot;
4) Implementation of an adapted version of the Austrian Service Package;
5) Coaching and consultancy on concrete questions and problems in the actual building project;
6) Offering contact and network for discussion questions and experience exchange with international experts;
7) Evaluation of actual project and compiling lessons learnt;
8) Documenting building process in terms of sustainable building and publishing results.
Evaluation process:
According to the joint evaluation guidelines and using interviews with the involved parties in the Kiruna Town Hall project as well as the continuous discussion of the project by the RCC.