I have just read Richard Quincey’s article (BSj 03/07) on his own low-energy home with interest and it maintains my belief that we can and should build even more in this vein.

It has re-enforced my humble view that the government should insist that “zero carbon” builds – which incidentally can never actually happen, but we can come damn close – should be happening now and not by 2016.

We do have the technology available and with large-scale building in such a way, we could bring cost down dramatically. With the right penalties and incentives in place, it would be surprising just how quickly it could happen in fact.

All of this should happen despite any crocodile tears from the major housebuilders. I am about to embark on a slightly different build project from Richard’s, in that I am buying a late-1960s bungalow that has been neglected and had virtually no upgrading carried out whatsoever.

As well as providing an annexe for my partner’s 93-year-old father, it is our intention to completely gut the building and to use a ground source heat pump, underfloor heating and solar heating to provide additional input for domestic hot water. The use of lambswool/hemp insulation in dormer walls and roof areas; foamed re-cycled crushed glass in the ground-floor build up; recycled bath/shower and washing machine water to flush loos and harvested rainwater for garden irrigation are just some of the innovations that will be employed in the project.

I am trying to show with this project that an older building can be brought up to a standard of energy usage somewhere approaching what that of new-build housing could, and should be. I am also attempting to show that with joined-up thinking, the integration and operation of energy-saving systems is not as daunting as many may think.

At least 98% of homes in the UK are not built to current Building Regulations standards and UK housing is the highest single player in the carbon emissions stakes.

Tony Thurgood

Source

Building Sustainable Design