Eco² Campus Microville 112 (initiated by AS&E) is an open cooperative educational place, located in the centre of the renovation process of former a Military Airbase, BA112, in Courcy, Grand Reims (FR). 

As a previous military airbase that has been closed for 10 years, Microville 112 is a unique pilot site, as there is no existing school running on the site. Therefore Alliance Sens & Economie has organised preliminary contacts and 3 co-design workshops that progressively involve a community of stakeholders (public, private, universities, research teams, and permanent education stakeholders) to assist in the challenge of planning for the reuse of a former military building that will be renovated as a central “Totem place” and first demonstrative facility (1962 m² on two level, 16 classes, each 69,3 m² / 11,3 m x6,1 m). This educational third place will interact with the former workshop building “Maître Ouvrier” which will host residency artists (633,4 m², ~16 rooms/artists cells), and a green courtyard in between the buildings, that will host creative exhibitions as outdoor class workshop activities. On the south facade, the neighbouring historical “Command building” on the Place d’Armes is intended to become a “New European Bauhaus cultural centre” and central meeting place in the heart of Microville112.

The History of the Eco² Campus Microville 112 

The villages surrounding the military base have built values of cultural openness and cooperative support shared by 3 generations through the survival of 2 world wars. In 2008, the Military Airbase was definitively closed, causing the population of the surrounding villages to decrease by half. The site has now been closed for 10 years, but the buildings are in a good state and nature has taken root with high-value adapted biodiversity areas.

The community and Village Council of Courcy has since made a commitment to develop a new forward-looking vision of their heritage, as a high-potential revival project with positive value for the site and the surrounding territory. Consequently, a high-level voluntary partnership was initiated with Alliance Sens & Economie, for a systemic renovation of the existing buildings/infrastructure/natural site with the support of a dedicated collective interest cooperative called “SCIC foncière Microville112”. This non-profit cooperative was created in December 2021. 

The property was transmitted from the French State Military Domain to the village of Courcy, initiating SCIC Microville112, and a process has been initiated to facilitate the installation of new occupants in transitional use of existing buildings through cooperative development by connecting with investors/project leaders. This is being achieved via attractive leasing with compensation as a cooperative investment in the commons instead of selling plots of land.

The Eco² Campus project

The Eco² Campus project was initiated in 2022, as a central “Totem place” and the first demonstrative facility. Using a pair of existing buildings for creating a multi-stakeholder cooperative “worksite-school”, systemic change scalable methods and high efficiency/low resource methods were applied to showcase innovative solutions for the Smart Climate Neutral renovation of Microville112. The aim is that this will become a systemic learning-action living-lab for the 30-minute territory of the Grand Reims urban area, and inspire other neighbourhoods/villages in France and the EU. The building will showcase prominent low-carbon renovation solutions, that will be upscaled to the whole Microville112 site as a Green Neighbourhood Campus and systemic renovation living-lab.

About the buildings

The ~40 existing buildings (5 main periods 1900, 1920, 1950, 1970, 1990 and different typologies) are generally supplied with thermal energy, electricity, water, and sanitation (5 district heating oil-fired  collective boilers, 1 wastewater treatment plant, 2 high voltage transformers,…). Half of the buildings have been retrofitted with double-glazed PVC windows and insulated internally. The roofs are mostly in good condition, though there are sloping roofs, non-habitable attics, and wood and metal structures. Walls consist of brick, natural stone, cement plaster, composite wood, metal, and insulated sandwich panels. The buildings are mainly oriented north-south with 2 main façades exposed to the natural daylight and sun.