How low can you go?

Can all new houses be zero carbon by 2016? You bet. But we need innovation now. Trevor Lawson meets the enthusiasts for change.

Driven the immensity of her objective, Jayne Lomas is cheerfully optimistic. “I’m really thrilled to be doing this,” she buzzes. She’s responsible for co-ordinating the Carbon Challenge at national regeneration agency English Partnerships, which has thrown down the gauntlet to developers to design and build flagship zero-carbon and low-carbon communities. The competition is all about getting the housing industry in gear to meetthe government’s 2016 target [see right].

The first sites have been chosen, in Bristol and Peterborough. But there’s a long way to go, admits Lomas. “It is a big ask… to deliver new and future environmental standards cost- effectively.” Especially when the housing industry is massively fragmented and investment in research and development is negligible, she says, relative to the size of the industry. But that’s exactly why we need competitions like these, compelling developers, architects and suppliers to work together.

Take the Millennium Communities project, for example, which started off as a competition. So far it has spurred the construction of 9,000 homes that use 80% less energy and 30% less water than conventional developments. Or the Design for Manufacture competition, which challenged developers to build “quality” new homes – in factories for construction on-site – for just £60,000.

While the competition wasn’t designed with sustainability in mind, “some of the developers excelled themselves,” says Steve Carr at English Partnerships. “There were some really good ideas, particularly for high density housing without resorting to flat developments. We managed to get volume house builders to work with architects. And even the traditional brick and blockwork industry came up with novel materials and methods that generated far less waste.”

Jim Kersey, a director at Entec and a consultant to English Partnerships, agrees. “The Design for Manufacture competition created some fantastic ideas, which are going to be key in reducing the environmental impact of homes,” he says.

He’s convinced that the industry is going to rise to the challenge the government has set.“It is possible to have a carbon neutral home,” he enthuses. We could learn a lot from the ‘passive house’ concept used in countries such as Germany and Sweden. These are buildings designed so well that they heat and cool themselves, and hence are ‘passive’. “With houses like these, renewable energy could meet all our domestic energy requirements.”

Of course such novel concepts aren’t always welcomed by those responsible for ‘development control’ in local authorities in the UK – where the emphasis tends to be on ‘control’. However, English Partnerships is tackling fears head-on by taking councillors to see green developments that have already been constructed. Though it is a bit of a catch- 22, he admits: “There aren’t many of them.The best examples are overseas, in places like Stockholm.”

He’s hopeful that the Carbon Challenge will play in vital role in improving understanding of sustainable development within the industry. Manufacturing houses off-site in hi-tech factories is all very well – until the site manager leaves the goods out in the rain overnight. Also, as Carr points out, some developers have tried to ditch flexibility and space in favour of crude marketing, by cramming in an extraen-suite bathroom or sticking up an internal wall to turn one room into two.

Nevertheless, Kersey is confident that a carbon-neutral future won’t mean shabby pre- fab houses sprouting up all over the place. “‘Pre-fab’ is a pejorative term these days,” he says. “But believe me, there is no comparison between these new homes and the pebble- dashed concrete panels that were craned into position in the 1960s.” – Trevor Lawson

Entec is a Forum for the Future partner.

20 September 2007

Trevor Lawson