The company
CLARA is developed by BuildWind, a Belgian engineering company that has worked since 2018 on the numerical simulation of the built environment: wind, air quality, heat and wind-induced noise around buildings and across cities, for architects, developers, municipalities and industry.
Alongside its consulting practice, BuildWind develops simulation and data platforms. CLARA is the latest step: the methods refined in hundreds of studies, packaged into a system that generates and runs environmental digital twins of entire cities. The first application, BrusAir, has served the City of Brussels since June 2025.
BuildWind srlRue Bara 173-177
1070 Brussels, Belgium
VAT number: BE0687548074
Web: www.buildwind.net
Email: [email protected]
The team
The people who build and run CLARA.
Alessandro Gambale
Co-founder and CEOAerospace engineer (MSc, La Sapienza, Rome). Research engineer at the von Karman Institute and research and teaching assistant at UMONS in environmental fluid dynamics, and a collaborator of ULB since 2015. He co-founded BuildWind in 2018 and led its research and its projects: ESA and European programmes, more than a hundred studies in nine countries, and a series of peer-reviewed papers on urban wind and air pollution. Since 2024 he leads the move from consulting to product, first BrusAir, then CLARA.
Gabriele Mosca
Co-founder and principal engineerSpace engineer (MSc in space engineering and space transportation systems, La Sapienza, Rome) with a PhD in engineering sciences from UMONS. He gained relevant professional experience in propulsion, combustion and fluid dynamics. He co-founded BuildWind in 2018 and built the simulation tools behind more than a hundred urban studies. Co-author of the papers on atmospheric boundary layer flows that underpin the platform.
Sampath Kumar Raghunathan Srikumar
Chief technology officerAerospace engineer (MSc, TU Delft), specialised in aerodynamics and computational fluid dynamics. Research assistant in TU Delft's wind energy department, then R&D engineer at BuildWind since 2021 and doctoral researcher at ULB. Co-author of the CLARA papers on urban wind and air quality modelling.
Research projects
The technology behind CLARA has been developed and validated through collaborative research projects with European, national and regional funding, alongside the peer-reviewed publications of the team.
SPICECO
CELTIC-NEXT · Innoviris 2021-RDIR-17bDevelopment and validation of an urban air quality predictive model based on Computational Fluid Dynamics simulation and machine learning. The direct scientific ancestor of CLARA's air quality engine.
SCULPT
ESA Kick-Start programmeSatellite-based CFD Urban Landscape Processing Tool: bringing Sentinel satellite data directly into high-resolution urban simulations for wind and thermal comfort.
MODELAIR
HORIZON-MSCA-DN-2021 · No 101072559Tools and models to reduce air pollution in urban areas, contributing to the EU Mission on climate-neutral and smart cities.
Featured in Horizon Magazine, the EU's research and innovation magazine: How AI is helping cities tackle invisible pollution (September 2026).
WEB, Wind Energy Brussels
Innoviris 2022-JRDIC-7aCombined wind simulation and lifecycle analysis for the development of wind-driven renewable energy districts in the Brussels Capital Region.
PLENTY-LIFE
LIFE Project Grants 101081061Cross-sector planning and capacity building to enable small and medium-sized municipalities to develop and monitor sustainable strategies for the transition to clean energy.
Partner with CLARA
We are looking for partners to co-create new local digital twins across Europe:
- Cities and public authorities looking for high-resolution urban microclimate monitoring.
- Research centers with expertise in urban microclimate physics.
- Tech SMEs: IoT hardware and smart-city platform providers.
For funded research projects, from small city pilots to European consortia, see our R&D page.