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| A weekly newsletter zooming in on Europe through local perspectives. Every Friday, one topic explored by five independent newsrooms. | | IN THIS ISSUE | §01 · In focus — Demolition
§02 · The local view — Berlin, Riga, Warsaw, Vienna and Zagreb
§03 · The podcast — Listen to the latest episode and join the conversation
§04 · From the newsrooms — Recent reporting from the lensEU network |
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| §01 · IN FOCUS | Demolition instead of renovation: What we lose when we build | Building is often seen as a sign of progress: new homes, modern buildings, better infrastructure. But before something new can be built, the old often has to go first. Across Europe, large numbers of buildings are demolished every year. And surprisingly often, they are not ruins, but buildings that could still be used. | CORRECTIV co-founded the Demolition Atlas and later the Demolition Atlas Europe to help close this gap. People can use it to report buildings that have been demolished or are at risk of demolition. What started as a project in Switzerland has since grown into the Demolition Atlas Europe (add a building). The data collected makes visible what otherwise often remains hidden: Where are buildings being demolished – and what happens afterwards?
Demolition is about far more than a building simply disappearing. It also means losing materials that have already been produced and built into it: concrete, steel, glass, timber and masonry. Many of these materials could be reused or recycled. Instead, demolition generates huge amounts of construction and demolition waste. In the European Union, this sector accounts for more than a third of all waste. According to the European Commission, around 124 million tonnes of waste were generated by demolition alone in 2022. | Much of this is not actually worthless waste. Building materials could be reused or recycled. But that requires them to be separated, processed and used again. In practice, a lot of materials end up in landfill or are not reused to their full potential. The problem is particularly serious when hazardous substances such as asbestos are disposed of improperly. They can contaminate soil and water, posing risks to the environment and human health. | There is also the issue of climate change. Demolishing a building and then constructing a new one requires large amounts of concrete, steel and other building materials. Producing them is energy-intensive and generates CO₂ emissions. According to estimates by the NGO German Environmental Action, demolition and new construction alone produce around 3.3 million tonnes of CO₂ a year in Germany. Some of these emissions could be avoided by renovating and continuing to use existing buildings. | Renovation does not necessarily mean completely reinventing a building. New windows, better insulation or a modern heating system can make an old building far more energy-efficient. At the same time, much of the existing structure can be preserved.
This is particularly relevant in the context of Europe’s climate targets. The European Green Deal aims to make Europe climate-neutral by 2050. Buildings play a central role in this effort: they account for a significant share of energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions in the EU.
At the same time, according to the European Commission, around three-quarters of Europe’s building stock is currently considered energy inefficient. The EU is therefore placing greater emphasis on renovating existing buildings. Its so-called Renovation Wave aims to increase renovation rates and make buildings more energy- and resource-efficient.
The goal is clear: Europe is to become more climate-friendly, and its buildings need to become more energy-efficient. Since May 2026, new EU rules on the energy performance of buildings have therefore been in force. Member states are expected to gradually modernise their building stock and achieve a zero-emission building stock by 2050.
But this creates a tension. Climate action is not only about how much energy a building consumes while it is in use. Demolishing it and producing the materials needed for a new building also generates emissions and consumes resources.
So why is demolition still so common?
There is no simple answer. For property owners and investors, new construction can be economically attractive. A site may allow for more floor space to be built. Modern standards can be incorporated from the outset. And in some cases, building new really does make more sense than renovating.
But the calculation does not end with the price paid by an investor.
Society also bears part of the cost: through resource consumption, CO₂ emissions and the disposal of construction waste. And for people living in a building, demolition can mean losing their home.
Building scientist Lamia Messari-Becker therefore advocates a stronger culture of adaptation and reuse. What matters, she argues, is not simply how old a building is, but what standard it needs to meet and what it needs to be used for. New construction may appear more economically attractive because certain standards are easier to achieve and additional floor space can be created. But such calculations do not always take environmental and social costs sufficiently into account.
Renovation can also strengthen the local economy. While a large share of spending on new construction goes towards materials, renovation and conversion require more skilled labour. Local businesses can benefit from this.
And preserving buildings can also be important for tenants. Europe is facing a shortage of affordable housing. Between 2015 and 2025, rents across the European Union, Norway, Iceland and Switzerland rose by an average of 21.1 per cent, according to research by CORRECTIV.Europe earlier this year. When affordable existing homes are replaced by more expensive new buildings, it can put additional pressure on the housing market.
The question of demolition and new construction is therefore also a question of political choices and regulation. The EU wants to accelerate the energy renovation of its building stock. At the same time, reliable data on how many buildings are actually being demolished is still lacking.
This leaves a fundamental question: Why do we so often build new when there is already so much existing building stock? If demolition and new construction are economically attractive for individual actors, while the costs of waste, resource consumption and CO₂ emissions are borne by society as a whole, then we need to ask whether the incentives are right.
A sustainable building policy should therefore pay greater attention to what is already there. Not every old building can or should be preserved. But before the wrecking ball hits, one question should be asked: What can we reuse?
Because every demolition takes more than concrete with it. It takes resources, energy and materials – and often a piece of a city’s history. The building transition could therefore begin less with the question of what we want to build next, and more with the question of what we can preserve. | — Lilith Grull, international Reporter, CORRECTIV |
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| | | Berlin · Germany · CORRECTIV | Displacement through demolition | Across Europe, affordable homes are being demolished to make way for more expensive new developments. Even publicly owned housing companies are forcing long-standing tenants out of their homes. But in a historic workers’ estate in Essen, residents are fighting back.
The Litterode estate in the German town of Essen consists of 19 small houses built for miners and their families in the 1930s. Many residents have lived there for decades; some families for generations.
The municipal housing company Allbau decided to demolish the estate, arguing that renovating the ageing buildings would not be economically viable. The plan is to replace them with 73 new homes, including houses for sale, at a cost of around €26 million. For residents such as Hevres Becker, however, Litterode is far more than a collection of old buildings. It is her home, her community and the place where her family has built their life.
A study by architecture professor Tim Rieniets and his students found that the houses could actually be renovated and modernised, while additional homes could still be built on nearby vacant land. Despite this, demolition went ahead. Residents also fear that the new homes will be unaffordable. Becker says the replacement flat offered to her family would be too small, while the rent would be at least twice as high as what they currently pay. | The case shows that demolition is not simply about replacing old buildings with new ones. It can also determine who can afford to remain in their neighbourhood – and who is forced to leave.
Marius Münstermann, Reporter, CORRECTIV.Europe |
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| | Riga · Latvia · TVNET | Demolish or Renovate: The Dilemma of Latvia’s Old Buildings | Demolishing an old building and putting up a new one can sometimes seem like the simplest solution. But from an environmental perspective, this approach comes at a cost: the construction sector generates huge amounts of waste and requires new materials. | Construction and demolition waste accounts for more than a third of all waste in the EU. It includes concrete, bricks, wood, metals, glass and plastic. The European Commission stresses that many of these materials can be reused, although recycling rates vary widely between countries.
For Latvia, this issue is especially relevant given the condition of its housing stock and the growing interest in renovation. In 2026, ALTUM’s programme to improve the energy efficiency of apartment buildings received so many applications that the available 173 million euros in funding was fully reserved in just six weeks. As a result, acceptance of some new applications had to be temporarily suspended as early as September.
At the same time, construction activity itself is growing. In 2025, the volume of demolition and site preparation work in Latvia increased by 7.4 per cent compared with the previous year, while in the second quarter of 2026, building construction grew by 12.6 per cent.
The European Commission is increasingly encouraging buildings to be assessed across their entire life cycle - taking into account not only the energy used during operation, but also emissions from the production of materials, construction and eventual demolition. Recommendations published in 2026 specifically highlight the advantages of renovating and adapting existing buildings where technically possible: this can reduce the need for new materials, the amount of waste, and the associated emissions.
That is why the question of whether to demolish or preserve a building is less and less about the price per square metre alone. Increasingly, it also means calculating what will end up in a container together with the old house.
Andrejs Timofejevs, journalist, TVNET GRUPA |
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| | Warsaw · Poland · OKO.press | Why Poland’s Prefabricated Blocks Aren’t Going Anywhere | Every time news is out in Poland that a communist-era block of flats has been slated for demolition or is about to be demolished, the old debate begins raging anew: how long before tens of thousands of prefabricated buildings go past their use-by date? | As it turns out, not anytime soon. Prefabricated bloki remain a core part of Poland’s housing stock even though the oldest of them have been in use for nearly seven decades. Research has found that they are generally still structurally sound, while cases in which authorities have decided to demolish them remain few and far between.
This isn’t a small issue. Poland has an estimated 60,000 prefabricated apartment blocks, built mainly between 1960 and 1990. They house an estimated 12 million people, roughly a third of Poland’s population.
Housing estates made up of prefabricated blocks often form entire districts in Polish cities and towns. Notably, despite shortcomings such as small flats or windowless kitchens, many remain in demand because of their locations and the way they were planned. Their design gave considerable importance not only to the buildings themselves but also to the spaces around them, including playgrounds, greenery and other communal areas.
Mass demolition appears out of the question, then, as – outdated as they may seem – prefabricated buildings aren’t simply places where people live and sleep, but threads in the fabric of Poland’s urban areas that would be nearly impossible to pull out without unravelling much of what surrounds them.
Wojciech Kość, environmental journalist, OKO.press |
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| | Vienna · Austria · Die Presse | Vienna’s historic buildings face the threat of the wrecking ball | Anna Rubner and Patrick Scherer are standing in front of a four-storey historic building, the paint on which is flaking off the façade in many places. This Gründerzeit-era building on the Währinger Gürtel in Vienna is set to be demolished at the beginning of next year, to make way for an underground station.
In some quarters, this is causing a stir: a petition has been launched against it, and the last remaining tenants, along with a few local residents, have protested against the demolition. Nevertheless, the plans are likely to go ahead; after all, the city argues, this will also improve the local infrastructure.
Rubner and Scherer aren’t entirely convinced by this argument. The two are far too attached to the aesthetics of old Vienna. That’s why they now spend a good portion of their free time wandering around derelict and demolition-bound old buildings, filming them to preserve them for posterity.
The issue of housing stirs up strong emotions, as they’ve also noticed from the feedback. At the same time, conflicting interests are at play here: the need for affordable housing; the desire to preserve an aesthetic that, for many, is part of Vienna’s DNA; the city’s aim to modernise its infrastructure; and the interest of property owners in building profitably. “I simply think we should treat the existing built heritage with respect,” says Rubner.
In 2023, protection against the demolition of old buildings was extended through a legislative reform. The criteria for determining when a building is fit for demolition were tightened, as were the obligations regarding its upkeep. This has made it more difficult to deliberately allow a building to fall into disrepair. However, buildings constructed after 1945 are exempt from this regulation, unless they are listed as historic monuments or are located within a conservation area.
In any case, Anna Rubner and Patrick Scherer want to prevent Vienna’s old buildings from disappearing without a trace.
Sissy Rabl, local reporter, Die Presse |
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| | Zagreb · Croatia · Telegram.hr | Croatia: High prices and shortage of workers | Over the past five years, Croatia’s construction sector has been shaped by two major developments. The first was reconstruction following two powerful earthquakes in March and December 2020, which caused extensive damage in Zagreb, including its protected historic centre.
The second was a massive wave of investment in construction projects across the country, from schools to thermal spas, fueled by generous funding from the EU’s Recovery and Resilience Facility (RRF).
The combination of abundant funding and high demand had predictable consequences: construction prices rose sharply, while a chronic labour shortage emerged that the domestic workforce could not fill.
As post-earthquake reconstruction accelerated, prices surged. In 2022, 2023 and 2024, major institutions – including the Government and the University of Zagreb – were forced to cancel construction tenders because bids far exceeded their budgets. In some cases, however, there was little alternative. The University of Zagreb’s landmark building, a protected cultural heritage site, was ultimately renovated for €27.8 million – more than twice the original €13 million budget.
Despite rising costs, funding remained available, initially through the EU Solidarity Fund and later the RRF. The latter helped trigger a broader construction boom, including comprehensive building renovations aimed at improving energy efficiency and reducing environmental impacts. | But money was not the scarce resource: workers were in short supply. Employment in construction rose from around 102,000 in July 2021 to nearly 127,000 in July 2026. Including workers in construction trades, the total workforce is estimated at more than 150,000.
Croatia therefore increasingly relied on foreign workers, particularly from non-EU countries. According to Ministry of Interior data, around 75,000 of the 206,000 work permits issued in 2024 were for construction. In 2025, the figure fell to about 52,000 out of 170,000 permits issued across all sectors. Through August 2026, nearly 30,000 construction work permits had been issued.
Wages vary by skills and job complexity. Despite recent raises, average net wages in construction remain below the national average. Labour representatives also report violations of the collective agreement and cases in which workers are officially registered at lower wages while receiving additional payments “under the table,” potentially reducing their future pension entitlements.
Irena Frlan Gašparović, journalist, Telegram.hr |
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| §03 · THE PODCAST | Demolish or renovate? The future of Europe’s buildings | Danai Maragoudaki, Journalist at SOLOMON, describes buildings as “vessels of memory. The character of a city is defined not only by its residents, but also by the buildings that tell its story.”
And this is exactly where the real conflict begins: What should a city preserve – and what is allowed to change without losing the local identity itself? | |
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| This episode explores what happens when Europe’s existing buildings are demolished – and what is lost in the process. Across Europe, buildings are often torn down not because they are unsafe or beyond repair, but because new developments are seen as more attractive or profitable.
In Germany (CORRECTIV), we examine the debate between demolition and refurbishment, asking whether existing buildings could often be adapted instead of replaced. In Essen, an old estate of 19 small houses with local historical significance was demolished to make way for high-priced housing.
In Greece, journalist Danai Maragoudaki from SOLOMON investigates the rapid transformation of Athens and other cities, where older buildings are increasingly demolished for new developments, particularly tourism and investor profit – raising concerns about architectural heritage, affordable housing and neighbourhood character. You can read about it here.
In Poland, Wojciech Kość from OKO.press looks at the future of the country’s prefabricated apartment blocks, or Wielka Płyta. Around 60,000 blocks house roughly 12 million people. While some are being demolished, others are being refurbished.
In Lubin, four blocks are planned for demolition to reveal historic landmarks, despite residents arguing that the buildings remain in good condition and that alternative housing could be unaffordable.
So how should Europe treat its existing buildings? When does refurbishment make sense, and when is demolition justified? Who bears the costs, who benefits, and what do we lose when a building disappears?
Do you know of a building that was or is going to be demolished? You can add it and its story to the growing Database on demolitions in Europe here. |
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