About Us

The Institute

The Institut für effiziente Energieanwendung in Gebäuden, IEI (Institute for Efficient Energy Use in Buildings), was founded in 1997 by Dr. A. Schneider and registered at the Olpe District Court under the registration number: VR 625.

Reasons behind the foundation include the: 

  • Membership of Dr. A. Schneider in the European Association for Renewable Energies Eurosolar (President H. Scheer),
  • Increasing importance of the topic "efficient energy use" in the economy, politics, society, and in the public media,
  • Emission reduction targets formulated at the UN Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED) in Rio de Janeiro in 1992 and the follow-up conferences, which the German government also endorsed, 
  • Insight that the translation of new findings into practical measures for the responsible use of limited energy reserves and environmental relief is hardly ever done.

The IEEG project "Ways to the low-energy house" integrated on these pages was supported by the:
- Ministry of Economic Affairs, Energy and Transport - North Rhine-Westphalia
- Ministry of Urban Development, Housing, Culture and Sports - North Rhine-Westphalia
- European Fund for Regional Development.

Dr. Adalbert Schneider is responsible for the scripts for both film series, and he also directed them. Christoph Herrmann, a well-known film editor, arranged the raw material for both films dramaturgically and effectively in conjunction with music and graphics. The camera was directed by Andreas Elmerer, Volker Noak, and Jens von Osten. The narrator for both films was Gert Alzen. A. Schneider is also the creator of the photos and graphic designs, which Christoph Herrmann and Stefan Lung realized. An early multimedia version of this content for DVDs is unfortunately no longer playable because the media format is no longer supported. 

Over the years, most of the founders of the association have reached retirement age. One colleague unfortunately passed away at a young age, and new blood for follow-up projects - e.g., on energy saving in industrial buildings with a wide range of possible applications of software-controlled regulations - could not be found.

The board therefore unanimously decided to dissolve the association in 2022. We are proud of what we have achieved, which we document in detail on these web pages, and at the same time saddened by the end of our mission, which in view of the current energy crisis is even more important than in the founding years of the association. We hope that our project presentation will continue to be useful in the future, despite many technical innovations.

In the News section, we will continue to report on interesting events and findings on the topic of energy saving and energy efficiency.

Board of Directors

Dr. Adalbert Schneider was the initiator, a co-founder, and member of the board of directors of the non-profit association Initiative für effiziente Energieanwendung in Gebäuden, IEEG (initiative for the efficient use of energy in buildings), founded in 2002, and he is the founder of the  IEI. ​Dr. Schneider's research focus is on the efficient use of energy in buildings under a holistic perspective. He planned industrial plants and buildings, was a member of Eurosolar (President was H. Scheer, winner of the Alternative Nobel Prize). ​He headed the research project "From old buildings to low-energy houses", which was carried out by the Institute for "Efficient Energy Use in Buildings" (IEEG) on an interdisciplinary basis in conjunction with scientists and companies. The IEEG association was dissolved in 2021. Dr. Schneider  published articles on energy efficiency and building refurbishment in specialist journals, and he was involved in promoting talented students, for example through competitions organized by VDI (the association of German Engineers) and Jugend forscht, or as a member of the technical guidelines commission for secondary schools.  Besides IEI and IEEG, he took further initiatives aimed at promoting cooperative, interdisciplinary, and innovative action in connection with scientific, public, and economic institutions. 

Dr. Bernd Krämer was a co-founder and member of the board of directors of IEEG. Until his retirement, he was head of the Chair of Data Processing Technology at the Faculty of Mathematics and Computer Science at the  FernUniversität in Hagen.  Besides IEEG, he is active in a few non-profit associations and scientific communities, which he co-founed. They include edu-sharing.net, the Scientific Academy for Service Technology (ServTech), the steering committee of the International Conference on Service-Oriented Computing, ICSOC, and theSociety for Design & Process Science (SDPS, past president, board member). His research interests include software engineering, service-oriented and cloud computing, and e-learning technology. With his interdisciplinary experience and knowledge of new media, he contributed to the contemporary dissemination of the project results. He designed the web pages, translated the contents into English, and was involved in the design of the didactic structuring of the remediation concepts and project results.

Dr. Ulrich Schwarz  was a co-founder and member of the board of directors of IEEG and IEI. He was part of the founding rectorate of the South Westphalia University of Applied Sciences as a prorector for teaching, studies, and study reform. His areas of interest include precision measurements of electrical quantities and electromagnetic compatibility. Dr. Schwarz was involved in this research project with student diploma theses.

Motivation & History

This video addresses the dependence of mankind on energy, the Initiative Innovation, Energy, Information (IEI), and the demonstration and research project Vom Altbau zum Niedrigenergiehaus (From an Old Building to a Low Energy House) presented on these pages. 

The content shown here is embedded by YouTube. When you load this content, connection data is passed to YouTube and you accept YouTube's privacy policy..​​ 

Show content