Facade of Linz’s dormitory becomes the solar power plant

A retirement home with a retro charm becomes a lighthouse project-according to the tenor at yesterday’s press conference on the construction site in Johann-Wilhelm-Klein-Straße. What is meant is the “Haus Barbara”, a wist of the Wist OÖ near the Johannes Kepler University in Linz, which is named after the late National Council President Barbara Prammer. The 13-story building, which was built in 1970 and visibly aged, is equipped with an energy-saving thermal insulation and on three sides with a photovoltaic facade. The PV system can generate more than 152,000 kWh of solar power annually and save about 33 tons of CO2.

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According to Linz-AG Director Erich Haider, who himself lived as a student in the Wist-Heim, and the CEO of the Wist OÖ, Manfred Schauberger, this is the largest PV facade at a residential building in Austria. In addition, the dormitory gets an electricity memory and an e-charging infrastructure. The memory also enables the PV current to be used outside of the sun old. 90 percent of the electricity are used up in the house itself.

Climate protection and cost efficiency

The Wist Upper Austria invests around five million euros for the PV facade alone, 1.5 million euros of it come as funding from the federal government, state and city. According to Wist, the additional effort compared to a pure facade renovation is amortized after about seven years. “The project with the Wist Upper Austria shows once again that climate protection and cost efficiency complement each other well,” says Bernd Freisais, Managing Director of Linz-Energieservice GmbH (Les), which developed the concept for Wist Upper Austria.

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