Low carbon existing homes a step closer
The Government’s draft Heat & Energy Saving Strategy was launched yesterday, which includes the following key points:
- 7 million homes to have ‘whole house’ heat and energy efficiency by 2020
- Household carbon emissions cut by a third by 2020
- All homes and buildings to be ‘approaching’ zero carbon by 2050
- New finance mechanisms to help consumers pay for low carbon refurbishment
- New delivery body being considered to co-ordinate roll out of energy efficiency
- All households to have access to Home Energy Audits
- Door left open for regulation on minimum standards of energy efficiency in homes
Paul King, chief executive of the UK Green Building Council (UK-GBC) has welcomed the Government’s draft which follows UK-GBC’s report in October 2008 on the key barriers to low carbon homes. King said, ‘Crucially, this strategy also sets out some practical steps for overcoming the barriers which homeowners, landlords and social housing providers face – how to get the best information, who to trust and the high upfront costs of green refurbishment.’ But he warned that there was still a lot of work to do and that ‘the Treasury needs to raise its game in the upcoming Budget. Financial incentives are needed to encourage major green refurbishments - the precedent has already been set with stamp duty rebates for zero carbon homes.’
The Government is apparently considering a scheme proposed by the UK GBC last year, whereby householders access a package of low carbon measures for no upfront cost, with energy bill savings that are greater than the loan repayments. Mark Elton, associate director and head of sustainability at ECD Architects, urges the industry to ‘give the Government the encouragement it needs through this consultation and then put pressure on the Treasury to back the plan financially, starting with refurbishment VAT cuts perhaps?’
Greg Slater, associate director at PRP Architects and member of the Existing Homes Alliance steering group welcomed the Government’s white paper saying ‘It shows the government is now recognising the scale of the challenge and the need for concerted action on a grand scale.’ Parity Projects managing director Russell Smith also welcomed the proposal saying ‘there are gaps to fill, but we must be clear that this is only a consultation, not hard and fast plans.’
According to Elton, the challenge of refurbishing 600,000 homes to a low carbon standard per year over the next 40 years should not be underestimated. ‘The industry is going to need to become much more carbon-literate, from the architect and the builder right along the chain to include the plumber and the building inspector. The devil is in the detail and achieving the necessary fabric insulation continuity and airtight refurbishment standards is going to be disruptive to householders, particularly in so-called Harder To Treat properties.’
Russel Smith, managing director of Parity Projects added: ‘It is essential that all people in the construction process are fully aware of the implications as every opportunity needs to be taken up; architects and builders are the first port of call for most homeowners and need to effectively ‘sell’ the notion that by spending a little more they can save on their bills. This will be backed up by financial support from Government. Architects are likely to be guided by a whole house plan for upgrade which will show them the most cost effective options to include in any upgrade or whole house refurbishment. It is not known at this time how this will be enforced, but if take up is slow, the only option is for such work to be regulated.’
The ‘whole house’ approach was also enthusiastically greeted by Smith as ‘the only way to ensure that each home gets anywhere near the 80 per cent CO2 target’ and means that ’simpler, less sexy measures will become our mainstay. For instance, we have shown in our demonstration house that CO2 savings of 55% can be made from draft-proofing and insulation alone. And this is the cheap element of the work.’
Smith also notes that Housing Associations have an opportunity to lead the way as architects working in this field ‘are already working closely with the contractors to work together on performance and buildability in the round.’ On the subject of Resident Social Landlords (RSL) Slater adds: ‘The strong indication is that the RSL sector is seen as a key pathfinder and an area from which examplars can be drawn to upskill and design models which will be inevitably rolled out through managed housing projects. This will benefit the private sector and smaller practices working on one-off projects.’
Filed under: Policy watch
I joined the UK GBC workshop on refurb which fed into this report and I thought it covered all the issues, so initiative is to be welcomed, and ATAP’ll be responding to consultation, I’d say its important that architects and designers do that.
There is a lot of detailed design that needs to be done if the work is to be done properly. If we leave it to energy companies and building industry suppliers, (who are the people gov seems to listen to ) we’ll have a load of glass fibre insulation in the roof and pvc windows replacing every timber double hung sash window.
What we need is architects to take a lead in showing how through neat and thoughtful design, good quality 19th c/20th c buildings can be transformed in a really sustainable way. We need demonstration projects funded on a street wide scale (Housing associations are having difficulty getting the funding needed to do this, we’re working with one to do a passivehouse refurb, but they haven’t got the funding together yet).
Gov consultation is good… but what we really need is the £ to just do it, and show how it can work!
Fran Bradshaw, Anne Thorne Architects Partnership