DGNB International

Anna Braune was born in Munich, Germany in 1974. She studied Environmental Engineering at the Technical University of Berlin and wrote her thesis on Life Cycle Assessment in collaboration with the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, Switzerland. From 2004 to 2007 she was a research assistant at the University of Stuttgart, Chair of Building Physics, Life Cycle Engineering Department, and she has also worked for a number of consulting firms in the field of sustainability and building service engineering. She is an initiator and founding member of the DGNB, where she served as CEO from the DGNB’s foundation in June 2007 to the end of 2008. Anna is now working at PE INTERNATIONAL, where she is responsible for PE’s Consulting Services Construction Team. Anna is an Auditor, Education Program Instructor, and Conformity Inspector for the DGNB, and part of the DGNB Experts Group on LCA.

Thomas Kleist was born in 1968. He received his Diplom in Structural Engineering from the Technical University of Dortmund in 1997. After his graduation he worked at HOCHTIEF Construction AG in construction management until 2004, when he became an independent consulting engineer for GreyDot Engineering. Since 2004 he has also been a lecturer at TU Dortmund, for the Chair for Construction and Building Process Management, and in 2007 he began collaborating with the engineering firm of Professor Gralla. In 2008 he joined the DGNB, where he is an Auditor, Education Program Instructor, member of the Certification Committee, and the leader of the Working Group for Industrial Buildings and Production Facilities. In 2010 he assumed the position of Assistant System Director, and in 2011 became the Director of the DGNB Academy.

Dr.-Ing. Wolfram Trinius studied engineering, and published his Dissertation entitled “Life Cycle Assessment in Construction” in 1999 at the Technical University of Stockholm (KTH). He founded the engineering firm Trinius in Hamburg in 2000, where he carries out consulting, research and development projects, as well as the development of standards related to sustainable building. He is academically engaged at the University of Gävle (HIG) in Sweden, and has represented Sweden in international committees dealing with sustainable building. The ISO Standards ISO 15686-6 (Service Life Planning of Buildings and Constructed Assets) and ISO 15392 (General Principles of Sustainability in Building Construction) were developed under his leadership. Through his collaboration in numerous international research projects he has established a broad portfolio of experience encompassing life cycle assessment, environmental product declarations, performance-based building, service life, and life cycle costs. Innovative sustainable building is also the focus of two EU research projects in which Dr. Trinius is playing a leading role: “STAND-INN”, which involves the integration of sustainability aspects into BIM Communication Standards (IFC/BuildingSMART) and which won the Europe-Innova Award for “Best Network 2008”, and “Smart-ECO”, which is investigating the potential contribution of innovative solutions and systems to the vision of sustainable building.
The work of Trinius Engineering in these exciting areas bridging innovation and sustainability, as well as its extensive experience with Swedish and international environmental assessment methods led the firm to become a co-founder of the DGNB, where Dr. Trinius is currently active in system development, on the Technical Committee, and as an Auditor, Education Program Instructor, and Conformity Inspector. He is furthermore a founding member of the Austrian Sustainable Building Council (ÖGNI), and his involvement in its Technical Committee further underscores his international credentials in the area of system development for certification systems. Dr. Trinius’ longstanding international engagement was highlighted again by his recent appointment as independent inspector of environmental product declarations under the IBU System.

Dipl.-Ing Jan Zak, born in 1976, works at the engineering firm of Prof. Dr.-Ing. Dipl.-Wi.-Ing. Kunibert Lennerts, where he has been employed since June 2009. Following his studies in architecture at the University of Karlsruhe, he worked as a research assistant at the Chair of Economy and Ecology in Residential Construction, led by Prof. Dr.-Ing. habil. Thomas Lützkendorf, as well as at the Institute for Industrial Construction Technology, led by Prof. Dr. Niklaus Kohler, both at the University of Karlsruhe (TH). In addition to many other projects, Mr. Zak was involved in the federal research initiatives which led to the development of the DGNB System, and provided technical expertise during the roundtable discussions on sustainable building held by the BMVBS. As of June 2010 he is also a member of the Certification Committee and the Retail Buildings Working Group.

Yvonne Brandenburger studied architecture in Düsseldorf and Berlin and worked for over 10 years at the international architecture firm J.S.K., planning and managing large scale projects. She complemented the practical experience of her occupation through continuing studies in Real Estate Management and Construction Project Management at the University of Wuppertal and Reading (GB). Since July 2008, Yvonne has been leading project management assignments and is responsible for the field of sustainability at IQ Real Estate GmbH in Düsseldorf. She attended the first seminar for DGNB Auditors and has since been appointed as a member of the DGNB Process Expert Group. She is also a visiting lecturer in sustainable construction at the University of Applied Science in Münster and at other academic institutions.

Michael Dax is Director of the DGNB International System and is responsible for system adaptation. He holds talks on a regular basis on the DGNB System at international conferences and has conducted training sessions of International Consultants. Mr. Dax studied architecture, and began his professional career in the mid nineties in a number of architecture firms across Europe and the United States. His expertise has been derived from leading corporate architecture and corporate design. He now has over 15 years of professional experience in both industry and consulting, and is an accredited DGNB Auditor.

Gerhard Hoffmann, (Dipl.-Ing./Dipl.-Wirt.Ing.) Managing Director of ifes – Institute for Applied Simulation and Energy Facility Management GmbH, Frechen – has been advising developers, investors, architects and planners in the realization of sustainable and energy-efficient buildings for 30 years, both nationally and internationally. From 2000-2008 he also held a position as a lecturer at the Department of Architecture at the University of Applied Sciences in Münster, teaching about the sustainable design of buildings. He contributed his extensive experience to the development and introduction of the DGNB certification standard, and since 2008 has audited numerous projects which obtained Gold and Silver certification. He is now a DGNB Senior Auditor. The team at ifes provides advice on the development of energy-efficient and sustainable buildings, and on the technical equipment such projects require. 20 years of experience and ideas combined with innovative simulation methods and comprehensive knowledge of the latest renewable energy technology allows ifes to conceive and implement state-of-the-art engineering solutions which are both environmentally and economically sustainable. Quality assurance by virtual building design and simulation is the basis for these consulting services, providing maximum cost-cutting potential. The use of simulation software allows the quality of projects to be assessed and optimized in the early planning phase.

Martin Kusic studied Chemistry at the University of Siegen and Architecture at the Technical University and the University of Applied Sciences in Munich, as well as at UdK Berlin and Bauhaus University Weimar. He is an accredited Architect, and founded his own office in 1996. From 1999 to 2006 he taught descriptive geometry and presentation techniques at the Universities of Applied Sciences in Augsburg and Munich. In 2005 he founded a company with the objective of reducing carbon emissions by reducing the energy demand of buildings, and worked there as CEO until 2010. He has authored publications on energy efficiency and energy consumption calculation software, and since 2010 has been working in the Efficiency & Sustainability project group of mürlepartner Construction Management.

Simone Lakenbrink was born in Soest, Germany. She began her professional career as an Architectural Draftsperson at the engineering firm of Franz Fischer GmbH, Dortmund. She then studied Spatial Planning at the Technical University of Dortmund, and in June 2007 began working as a Project Manager at DU Diederichs Project Management AG&Co.KG. She concurrently studied Real Estate Management and Construction Project Management (REM-CPM) at the post-graduate level at the University of Wuppertal/University of Reading, and in 2009 began working as a Guest Lecturer in REM-CPM. She has been involved in the development and support of the DGNB since 2008, and became an accredited DGNB-Auditor in 2009. In 2010 she joined the Process Quality Working Group and became an Education Program Instructor. In March 2011 she began working at ARCADIS Germany GmbH, where she is responsible for Green Building Certification and Consultancy.

Thomas A.J. Oebbecke studied architecture at the FH Bielefeld University of Applied Sciences. He broadened his experience with a scholarship to the Illinois Institute of Technology in Chicago, where he studied urban and regional planning. His Diplom thesis, submitted in 1994 in Bielefeld, re-evaluated the internal logistics of a clinic, using the Magdeburg Clinic as a case study. An opportunity for a second scholarship to IIT arose through his teaching activities at FH Bielefeld, and he traveled to Chicago again as part of an exchange program for teaching assistants. He wrote his Master’s thesis there in 1996, on the sustainable restoration of Chicago through “Urban Clustering using Low Rise and High Density Planning Methods”, with the objective of reducing the approximately 1.6 million daily commuters into the city by half over the next 20 years. After his return to Germany he consulted on projects in China, Bulgaria, and Bosnia as an international architect. He became a member of the DGNB Technical Committee in 2009, and joined ARCADIS Germany GmbH in 2010, where he is a leading member of the Green Building Department in Germany, a role devoted to the development and promotion of the DGNB Certification System.

Dr.-Ing. Consolata Russelli was born in Turin, Italy in 1977. She studied Civil Engineering at the University Politecnico of Turin and at the Institute National des Séances Appliqués of Lyon, France. Following an internship at the Construction Dynamics Department of the TNO Building and Construction Research Institute in Delft, Netherlands, she graduated in 2002 with her thesis entitled “Rail-Traffic-Induced Vibrations on Building Foundations”. From 2003 to 2007 Consolata was a research assistant at the Institute for Geotechnical Engineering at the University of Stuttgart, where she earned her doctorate with her thesis on “Probabilistic Methods applied to the Bearing Capacity Problem”. She began her professional career as Project Manager for R&D at the Timber Structures Department of the Otto-Graf Institute (MPA) at the University of Stuttgart. She is now Coordinator of the DGNB International Academy and responsible for the DGNB Partner Network. In June 2011 she was accredited as a DGNB International Consultant.

Robert Himmler was born in Stuttgart, Germany, in 1969. He studied mechanical engineering at the University of Stuttgart, and wrote his thesis on the subject of concrete core heating and cooling systems in energy efficient buildings. He has worked at numerous consulting companies involved in energy efficient building, building simulation, and HVAC design. In 2007, together with Univ. Prof. Dr.-Ing. M. N. Fisch and Dr.-Ing. Dirk Schwede, he founded EGS-plan International GmbH, a company with a strong focus on sustainable buildings in Asia, Eastern Europe and the MENA region. He is a DGNB International Consultant and Junior Education Program Instructor.

Dipl.-Ing. Tobias Fischer, born in 1976, is a senior consultant at ikl, the engineering firm of Prof. Dr.-Ing. Kunibert Lennerts GmbH. Since graduating with a degree in architecture from the University of Karlsruhe (TH) he has worked for offices in Stuttgart, Karlsruhe and Mexico City. In addition to planning and participating in the construction process for numerous buildings, he has engaged himself in projects with a special focus on the sustainable use of resources, such as energy and water.  He is actively committed to the German Sustainability Council (DGNB) not only as a practicing Auditor, but also through the development of new user profiles, for example as head of the Working Group for the new “Modernization of Existing Residential Buildings” Occupancy Profile.