The report West Midlands Low Carbon Housing Market Framework, produced by Forum for the Future and URBED, for the West Midlands Sustainable Housing Action Programme, provides an action plan for reducing carbon emissions from both the existing housing stock and new-build homes, in line with national and regional targets.

With 20,000 new homes a year planned in the regional housing strategy, and the building regulation increasing to be zero carbon by 2016, the report makes recommendations as to how this can be achieved through local and regional policy and strategy.

It also highlights the huge task required to address the 2.3 million existing homes in the region, 70% of which are owner occupied. We predict that an annual refurbishment rate is required of at least 20,000 properties by 2011, rising to at least 80,000 by 2016 and that this will need to be maintained for a minimum of 20 years.

Improving energy efficiency needs to be both easy and convenient, and that all opportunities and points of influence are taken. Providing a clear, structured and consistent approach will present huge opportunities for community based social enterprise and the business community.

Although this research and framework focus on the West Midlands, the scale of the progress required and the opportunities available are replicable across the UK’s 26 million homes.

The ‘Housing Market Framework’ report is downloadable below.
The ‘Lessons From Best Practice’ has been split into three parts for download.
Download Lessons from Best Practice Part 1

Download Lessons from Best Practice Part 2

Download Lessons from Best Practice Part 3

Download now: West Midlands Low Carbon Housing Market Framework