The background
The network company Alliander wants to develop a replacement location in Sloterdijk with space for training, work stations, test areas and indoor and outdoor storage. Copper8 is drawing up an ambition document that ensures all sustainability requirements and wishes are formulated concretely and can also be realized. The result: a location with added value, in terms of both society and sustainability.
Context
Alliander already has several locations that set an example in the field of sustainability. This is the aim for the new location in Sloterdijk too. Alliander feels responsible for its impact on the environment. The organization is working on a sustainable energy supply in the Netherlands and on sustainability within the organization itself, including when it comes to accommodation. When you’re developing a sustainable work environment, you also need to consider its location. It’s not just Alliander’s own sustainability strategy that’s important; the characteristics and goals of the Sloterdijk District (Stadsdeel Sloterdijk) and Municipality of Amsterdam must also be taken into account. To bring all these ambitions and values together in one reality, they have to be formulated clearly and applicably in an ambition document that reflects every party.
The question
Support Alliander in the establishment of a forward-looking ambition document on the topic of sustainability for the new location in Sloterdijk 3. In doing so, ensure a connection between the values of Alliander and those of the Municipality of Amsterdam. Following that, make these concrete principles that international design agency De Zwarte Hond can translate into its design.
Current situation and future
The sustainable identity of the new accommodation in Sloterdijk 3 is being designed as a sustainable, intelligent development. This is translated into four sustainable themes, which will be made concrete as follows:
- Value creation for now: climate change, (minimal) healthy ecological materials, circular use of materials and biodiversity;
- Resilient and future-oriented: circular design, water adaptive, organizational adaptivity;
- Connected with the environment and user: energetic exchange and storage, appropriate for the social and ecological environment, sustainable mobility;
- Digitalized and innovative: monitoring (health and energy), pilot environment, value chain transparency.
The process
First we delved into the values of Alliander, the Municipality of Amsterdam and the Sloterdijk District. We did this by studying various policy documents, interviewing interested parties and bringing the shared ambitions together in one document. Based on this inventory, we held ambition sessions with representatives from Alliander, the Municipality and the District, in which we translated the ambitions into concrete requirements. This is how we formulated the ambition document that forms the basis for the further development of the design, as well as the tender for the executive parties.
We then held two review sessions with the design team. First, we discussed the strengths and weaknesses of the design and mapped the challenges in relation to the sustainability ambitions. We then invited experts on various ambitions to help the design team take the next concrete steps.
The results
By formulating its sustainable ambitions in as concrete and applicable a way as possible, Alliander now has a location that is sustainable, flexible, scalable and modular. The buildings’ impact on the environment is minimal, and the location can be adjusted if the uses they are needed for change in the future. This ‘sustainable, intelligent development’ is in line with Alliander’s values and sustainability strategy and the sustainable ambitions of the Sloterdijk District and the Municipality of Amsterdam. Another sustainable outcome has been added within Alliander.