For place’s sake – refurbish, don’t rebuild
Preserving the unique sense of place and identity associated with communities is a key element of placemaking. The refurbishment of homes, rather than demolition and replacement, should be seen as a favourable sustainability option, says Cathy Hough, Energy for Sustainable Development (ESD)
Energy use from our 26 million homes accounts for nearly a third of the UK’s carbon emissions. Yet for all the glorious architectural heritage of our Victorian and Edwardian terraces, there lies a legacy of woefully inadequate insulation, aging heating systems and inefficient appliances.
In a century of climate change and rising energy prices, our existing housing could turn out to be our greatest liability. Developing a sustainable energy and carbon strategy for regions, towns, villages or buildings is crucial to the planning and achievement of lower carbon emissions.
In an ideal scenario, whole streets or estates would have a ‘make-over’, thus bringing down costs. There are several projects, mainly within social housing, where this approach has been taken.
Industry experts agree that community-based energy schemes, in which new and existing communities together benefit from the renewable energy solutions now being developed, are the way forward. But the delivery of most such schemes remains years away. For now, we need to focus on other ways to reduce energy demands.
Estimates indicate that over 80 percent of existing homes will still be standing in 2050. If we are to have a hope of meeting the Government’s target of a 60 percent cut in carbon emissions by 2050, prompt action needs to be taken to start tackling our existing housing stock. Taking a holistic approach to improving homes, rather than piecemeal improvements, can deliver economies of scale while minimising disruption to the household.
Preserving the identity of communities is a key element of placemaking. This is one reason why refurbishing homes, rather than demolishing them and replacing with new ones, is seen as the favourable option. A radical programme of eco-refurbishment would help create new jobs, skills and business opportunities, enhancing the UK’s competitiveness in the low carbon economy.
The good news is that much can be achieved by comparatively simple measures that are well tested and proven. Improved wall, floor and roof insulation, high-performance windows, draught stripping techniques, high efficiency boilers and energy efficient lighting can often lead to huge savings.
With the intrinsic efficiency of the building improved, microgeneration from solar water heating, solar photovoltaics, biomass boilers and stoves, ground source heat pumps and low carbon district heating can reduce emissions further.
Changing the ‘look’ of our existing homes can be controversial, particularly where brick facades are hidden beneath external wall insulation, windows are exchanged or solar panels made visible on roof tops.
Yet with sensitivity we can protect the general character of buildings (for instance targeting external insulation on side and rear faÁades), whilst welcoming other changes as symbols of the intelligent, future-proofed home of the 21st century.
An ambitious demonstration programme, similar to the ‘Zukunftshaus’ (‘house of the future’) programme in Germany (in which thousands of properties were refurbished to a standard significantly higher than current new build standards), could kick start the development of a supply chain and skills development.
Similar projects have been carried out at universities across Germany. The Solanova pilot, from a team at the University of Kassel, has already converted large blocks of flats in Hungary to ‘superlow’ energy status. Whatever we do, we need to be bold, and we need to begin now.
Love where you live: creating green streets across the UK
Education will play a hugely important part then in reducing the environmental impact of our existing communities, says Wayne Hemingway of Hemingway Design. We need more examples of programmes such as ‘Green Streets’, he says. Green Streets is a year-long nationwide energy saving experiment, currently being run by British Gas and the ippr, designed to educate households about the steps they can take to reduce their emissions.
Green Streets is a community building project that gives eight streets £30,000 each to spend on energy efficiency. The most successful street in reducing its carbon footprint gets a further £50,000 worth of energy saving equipment to invest in a community project. ‘Projects like this are beneficial in more ways than just bringing carbon efficiency to forefront of householders thinking, says Hemingway.
‘They engender community cohesion, and the most sustainable thing that communities can do is to love where they live. We need to put down roots and end this wasteful short termism that has blighted too many housing developments from the 60s onwards.’
Existing homes: zero carbon needn’t break the bank
After five years, four applications, two appeals, a brawl in the Village Hall, a documentary on TV and the usual flood of letters, the team behind the Hockerton Housing Project (HHP), Nottinghamshire, finally obtained planning permission to erect the wind turbines that, along with solar PV and other energy efficiency measures, help to make them one of the UK’s first net zero carbon communities.
Due to a significant underperformance of the wind turbines, they have to purchase a net shortfall of about 20 per cent of their energy use for each of the six homes from a green energy supplier, but bills are still less than £100 per annum.
This is not quite zero carbon in the Government’s terms, even though HHP accounts for all its energy use and allocates it to ‘green’ energy.
This small pilot project has more recently encouraged and facilitated the wider village community of 50-plus homes to consider its energy use. The plan is to put in a bigger turbine to offset the energy used by the whole village, says Nick White of the HHP. ‘We want to be able to take responsibility for the carbon use in our homes.’
The HHP takes issue with the Government definitions of zero carbon as laid out in the Code for Sustainable Homes (CSH) – at least those relating to energy usage, rather than lifestyle changes – and with the expense needed to achieve CSH 6 zero carbon energy levels.
Instead of asking how much it costs, says the HHP’s Nick Martin, we need to ask: how do you build to this standard with no additional cost? ‘The zero carbon specification is currently a recipe for very expensive housing,’ says Martin. ‘It doesn’t have to be that way. A functional approach to house design and a tweak in the CSH definition will allow genuine zero carbon emission houses to be built within normal cost parameters.’
For more HHP ideas, and details of tours & workshops, visit www.hockertonhousingproject.org.uk
First planning condition to encourage energy efficiency when home extensions take place
Uttlesford District Council, Essex, has introduced a planning condition that requires cost-effective energy efficiency improvements to be carried out on dwellings when they are extended.
In this way, the extra energy that is used and carbon dioxide that is produced by the extension is compensated for by improvements elsewhere. Uttlesford District Council is the first local authority in the UK to introduce a requirement of this kind. UDC building surveyors also provide onsite advice on how to comply with the condition. More details at: www.uttlesford.gov.uk
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Woodfields
An example of an extreme low energy refurbishment is the Woodfields project in Hampshire, where a holistic approach has been taken to deliver substantial carbon emissions savings of up to 75 percent. Developers Drum Housing Association upgraded four semi-detached houses and two 1950s bungalows in early 2007. Could this success be replicated across the UK’s homes? To achieve carbon savings of 60 percent or more by 2050 across our housing stock we need to refurbish around half a million homes to a standard similar to the Woodfields project every year, starting now. ‘This means an urgent and radical response from government, the energy supply industry, the building trades, product manufacturers and suppliers, mortgage providers, homeowners and landlords, working together to develop innovative solutions,’ says the Energy for Sustainable Development (ESD). For further information on the Woodfields project www.generationhomes.org.uk
In 2008, a network of organisations called the Existing Homes Alliance will be calling for an urgent programme of action to tackle and improve our existing housing stock. Its ‘Declaration for Existing Housing’ sets out a challenge to government, energy suppliers, the financial sector, product manufacturers, suppliers, installers and the building trade, with a programme of key actions needed to make our housing fit for the 21st century. To support this initiative, visit www.existinghomesalliance.org.uk
