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October 18, 2007 - Carbon Free Homes

Readers may be interested in an article I wrote for Building Design:

“Compare Germany’s retrofit of its existing stock with our own seriously clunky energy commitment”

Why put a price on the priceless importance of carbon free homes?

Posted on October 18, 2007 11:51 AM | | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

November 5, 2007 - Today's housing debate

Today's housing debateThere is something incredibly narrow and reductionist about today’s housing debate, in that it all comes down to crude numbers. How many more houses do we need, by when and where?

Gordon Brown has of course upped the ante by plumping for 3 million new homes, which boils down to 240,000 net additional homes by 2016.

According to CPRE and many others, that’s scary enough. But they will be positively aghast at the new report from the National Housing and Planning Advice Unit (NHPAU) which argues that 240,000 is just for wimps, and what we really need is 270,000 new homes a year by 2016. So do I hear any advance on 270,000?

The NHPAU is a relatively new body which describes itself as “an expert body whose job is to tell decision-makers how they can make housing more affordable”. Fine – and an eminent bunch of people they are too. But CLG’s job (where most of these decision-makers reside) is to facilitate delivery of 3 million homes that are both affordable and sustainable. Not just affordable.

And the NHPAU clearly knows nothing about sustainability, and doesn’t even pretend to. But that makes its report mind-bogglingly inadequate, as it does all its clever sums without any serious reference to sustainability issues whatsoever. (I’m discounting the occasional tokenistic reference to “higher environmental standards” and the like – they are just there to provide the merest green veneer).

So what use is it, I wonder, for all those decision-makers in CLG and for Yvette Cooper herself, Minister for Housing to get a report that may be absolutely brilliant on the affordability side of things (but I’ve got some real reservations about that too, as it happens), but offers literally sod all on the sustainability dimension?

These days, you really can’t do the one without the other, which means that unless advice like this is properly “SD-proofed”, it’s really not of much use.

This lack of basic sd capability is such a huge problem across the whole of government, let alone across its advisory bodies. It’s exactly the same with Treasury’s Sub-National Review of Economic Development and Regeneration, drafted by all sorts of hugely intelligent economic wonks in Treasury who would probably be the first to admit that their only knowledge of sustainable development is their ability to spell the words – on 34 separate, largely meaningless occasions, as it happens (yes, I have counted!).

But I’ll have more to say on the Sub-National Review in a wee while. Meanwhile, I just hope someone is going to take their green pen to the NHPAU’s report.

Posted on November 5, 2007 12:43 PM | | Comments (11) | TrackBacks (0)

March 3, 2008 - Wanted: a code for sustainable buildings

What a treat yesterday (28/3): a visit to the EcoBuild Exhibition at Earls Court. I think this is the fourth or fifth of these exhibitions – and it started out very small and very ‘niche’.

The 2008 Exhibition is big, bold and bullish. With dozens of mainstream industry giants mixing it with innovative start-ups, government departments, industry organisations and so on.

The cumulative impact is very impressive, a powerful statement to politicians and citizens alike that if we want to live in sustainable homes, work in sustainable offices, shop in sustainable retail outlets, work out in sustainable gyms, etc etc, then we really are capable of figuring out exactly how to do it.

We are just in the foothills of the innovation mountain that we now have to climb, but the prospect already looks pretty good.

And for those who are sceptical about this Government’s passion for target-setting, you would have been heartened to see the way in which the 2016 target for zero-carbon housing is now impacting on the entire sector. Lots of doubts from the industry, lots of confusion (what is the difference between zero carbon, low carbon, very low carbon and carbon neutral?), but a gathering focus on what now needs to happen.

All this provides yet another example of the way in which timely and decisive regulation drives innovation. So, what we need next is a Code for Sustainable Buildings (commercial, retail industrial) to match the Code for Sustainable Homes, with the same kind of stepped standards kicking in at different milestones along the way. And given that things have moved a lot since the 2016 target was adopted for houses, in terms of the new consensus about the science of climate change, let’s go for the same target date of 2016 for all buildings, and just squeeze the intervals between the different steps along the way.

Posted on March 3, 2008 9:35 AM | | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)

June 2, 2010 - Grand Designs on Sustainable Housing

Encountered my first Minister in the new Coalition government – in the shape of Grant Shapps, Minister for Housing – on Thursday last week at the ‘Opening Ceremony’ for a new housing development getting underway in Swindon.

Not just any old housing development. The Triangle is a 42-home, mixed tenure, affordable scheme, the design for which has been put together by Kevin McCloud (of Grand Designs fame) and a housing association called Green Square. All the houses will meet Code Level 4 in the code for Sustainable Homes, and some of them Code Level 5. It’s backed by the Housing and Communities Agency (to the tune of £2.5 Million) and by DECC’s Low Carbon Innovation Fund. And the main contractor is Willmott Dixon, who were there in force at the opening.

It was Grant Shapps’s first outing as minister – so new that he inadvertently described himself as ‘Shadow Minister’ on one occasion. He did well – not just in his enthusiasm for the project itself, but in simultaneously confirming the 2016 target for zero carbon housing in England. This had somehow been left out of the Coalition’s new Programme for Government, which had caused a bit of a stir. He also pledged to bring to an end a three-year stand-off on how exactly ‘zero-carbon’ will be defined (‘that’s not as easy it sounds, by the way!’) within weeks. And that would be impressive.

Somewhat to the consternation of his equally new officials, he also had to familiarise himself with the brand new building material called ‘Hemcrete’, this is made out of hemp, produced by a company called Lime Technology, and it’s being used as the principal building material for the 42 houses.

I think he got a real buzz discovering more about Hemcrete – as did I. Kevin McCloud is already very enthusiastic:

“Hemp is the second fastest growing crop on the planet, after bamboo, so it can be slotted in between other crops during a growing season. It also requires almost no inputs, and enriches the soil. It’s non-combustible, breathable, tough and flexible, and has remained our first choice ever since we saw it being used.”

It also makes a hell of a difference in terms of greenhouse gas emissions when compared with traditional brick or concrete blocks in a normal wall section – to the tune of around 130kg less in terms of CO2 per m2 . Which makes it a genuinely ‘carbon positive’ material – as in more carbon locked up than emitted.

What really excited me about all this is the way in which innovation is, at long last, beginning to impact on a hugely conservative, risk-averse industry. There were even some leading Private Equity Investors present at the opening ceremony – and that has to be a good sign!

Posted by Jonathon Porritt on June 2, 2010 6:40 PM | | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

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