Sustainable Buildings: The Rehabilitation Project

The city of Lisbon currently faces some problems regarding built heritage management. This because the conservation state of buildings has been neglected for years. Today, the historic area of the city is characterized with buildings in high state of degradation, whose maintenance was in many cases non-existent. The care that a building requires is constantly underwritten and most of the interventions that have actually been verified are plastic rather than structural. Which brings us to another problem, since it is a city with eminent seismic risk. Part of the proposed solutions don’t even show respect for the built heritage history or the necessary attention to the existing mechanical capabilities, which is an obstacle to a balanced and sustainable development. In view of the above, this article purpose is to verify how rehabilitation can make a building sustainable in an city lacking with immediate results. Sustainability should be understood as the communion of indicators that foster proposals with solutions that last in time, economically accessible and of zero or reduced environmental impacts. To this end, case study of a apartment rehabilitation project located in Lisbon’s historic area will be presented, with characteristics that marked a constructive time and on which any proposal can not be invasive. It is intended to discuss some rehabilitation solutions in buildings whose construction system requires a series of structural, aesthetic and technical care, in particular as regards the relationship between the various materials (existing and proposed) and also energy efficiency.