Sustainability

Our corporate units and their employees support numerous organizations worldwide with monetary donations, contributions in kind, and personal involvement.

In 2009, for the second time we granted the international Bilfinger Berger Award for exemplary urban-development concepts. The Award includes prize money of €50,000 and encourages cross-border knowledge transfer in the field of urban development, thus providing urban planners – particularly in Germany – with stimulating ideas and concepts that they can use in their work. Last year, the focus was on remedial concepts for former industrial sites, solutions for the revitalization of disused docklands, and model projects for inner-city transport.

With a total of 120 projects submitted and participants from 16 countries, the Bilfinger Berger Award once again met with a lively response in 2009. The Prognos Research Institute assessed the quality of the entries and prepared a shortlist. Finally, the winner was chosen by a fourman jury chaired by Professor Klaus Töpfer, German Environment Minister from 1987 to 1994: an urban renewal project in the Holmbladsgade district of Copenhagen, which was previously a problem suburb. Prof. Töpfer presented the prize to representatives and residents of the city together with Bilfinger Berger’s Executive Board Chairman Herbert Bodner in Copenhagen on July 9, 2009.

For a long time, Holmbladsgade was one of Copenhagen’s disadvantaged areas. Many of the buildings were constructed at the beginning of the twentieth century as workers’ apartments and were in urgent need of modernization by the middle of the 1990’s. Residents then decided to take action themselves. They were involved in all of the Kvarterloeft’s planning processes as well as in important decisions on investment in the social infrastructure, the modernization of residential buildings, roads and piazzas.

Experts are agreed that this activation of residents ensures the acceptance and sustainability of urban-development projects. In a survey, more than 80 percent of Holmbladsgade’s residents stated that they were aware of the renewal project in their district; more than ten percent were actively involved. As a result, the newly created public spaces, the cultural center, the sports center and the maritime youth center have become new lively focal points which are visited and used by hundreds of people every day.

Thanks to a joint effort by the state, the city, private investors and citizens, the living situation of the people on the spot has improved significantly. The residents have profited from the new urban facilities for culture, society, youth and sport. The previous social problems have been successfully solved or at least significantly alleviated.

The Group places high priority on providing support for young academics. We support renowned universities, such as RWTH Aachen, TU Darmstadt, TH Karlsruhe, TU Dresden, TU Berlin and the University of Mannheim, and make a contribution towards the sound education of engineering and business administration students.

With the Technology is the Future initiative, Bilfinger Berger wants to stimulate school students’ interest in an engineering career at an early stage. We started the initiative in the form of a charitable company together with partner companies in German industry. The Knowledge Factory project starts even earlier: With the help of educational projects in kindergartens and schools, children get to know the exciting world of natural science, technology and economics. Bilfinger Berger supports the initiative and intends its involvement to create enthusiasm for technical occupations.

Bilfinger Berger continued its support for German Sport Aid and sponsored the Ball of Sports once again last year. The German Sport Aid foundation was established in 1967. It applies the funds it raises to support approximately 3,800 sportsmen and sportswomen each year in nearly all Olympic disciplines, traditional non-Olympic sports and sports for the disabled.

We also support numerous institutions outside Germany. In Australia for example, Bilfinger Berger donated a substantial amount to inhabitants of the state of Victoria who suffered from the severe consequences of a bush fire.