Report fossil-free living and building
About this good practice
The report combines data from the platform Provinces in Numbers in a report per municipality in Flanders. This was a combined effort of all 5 provinces, initiated by the province of East-Flanders. It combines data about districts or statistic sector, depending which information is available. This is data about the building (age, renovated or not, freestanding, appartment or single family home, etc). This part gives an idea of the renovation need in this particular district. The other section talks about the people living in the area (their age, income level, children, etc.). This could give an idea about their willingness to renovate. These two topics are combined, each with different graphs and tables, to give a clear view of which district has potential to intervene with a specific goal. This could be a collective renovation strategy, or a study checking whether district heating is possible. With this report, doubt is taken away from municipalities whether their actions are useful because the data combined shows them which neighbourhoods specifics there are in stead of blindly trying differents tactics without any backgorund information.
Resources needed
This requires heavily on available data and the available personell time. Work started a year ago, each province had at least 1 representative and East Flanders a dedicated group of 4 people coordinating. The funding is done by the provinces: for work time and relies on the existing database.
Evidence of success
The report is new since March 2025, so not much evidence has been gathered. However, other reports of Provinces in Numbers are used daily for data analysis. Earlier reports are fe being used in the training day organised by the Province of Antwerp concerning heat zoning. All provinces are planning specific moments to promote or use the new report to allow representatives of municipalities to use it. The report has the advantage that once made, all municipalities can generate their own report.
Potential for learning or transfer
There is a large potential for transfer, depending on the availability of local data. This first step with information on buildings and demographics is necessary before the report can be made.
The benefit of the report is that is is made on the spot per municipality, by combining the data layers behind it. So if more data is added, it is automatically integrated in the new reports.