Points West - Chartered Institute of Housing

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4POINTSWEST The Green OfficeNew Sustainable HQfor Flourish HomesThe use of brise solais, a reinforced concrete structure,ground source heat pumps, a rainwater harvesting systemand a green travel plan ensure that Flourish Home’s newoffices at Wells have been designed with sustainability inmind.The new sustainable HQ of Flourish Homes is dueto be completed in March 2011.The green factor started with the very initial design of thebuilding - particularly its orientation and shape.Thebuilding is oriented on an east-west axis and the whole ofthe south-facing elevation is glazed to enable maximumnatural lighting. Direct sunlight is controlled by the use ofbrise solais.This is designed to minimise direct sunlightdazzling people, thus reducing the need to use the blindsand hence use the lights!Also, the long and thin shape of the building maximisesthe opportunity for natural ventilation. High and low levelwindows, in conjunction with the building managementsystem, will enable night time purges of the building, thatis the removal of all the accumulated hot air in thesummer so that the offices are cool and fresh when staffarrive in the morning.Alongside this, the building is constructed from areinforced concrete structure which gives the building areally good thermal mass to keep the building cool insummer and warm in winter.And it has high levels ofinsulation to help with reducing the heating demands.Heating for the building will primarily be provided byground source heat pumps, with a back up gas boiler forpeak loads in winter and hot water is provided via solarhot water panels on the roof.There is also a rainwaterharvesting system in the toilets.The final key element is the introduction of a green travelplan, which aims to reduce single person car journeys byencouraging car sharing, use of public transport andcycling/walking.'GREEN OFFICEAWARD' forGREENSQUAREGreenSquare has won a top award at the 2010Corporate Green Awards, run by Wiltshire Wildlife Trustfor the housing group’s new HQ at Swindon. BarburyHouse was selected as a winner for its numeroussustainable initiatives.The building was chosen partly forits proximity to public transport and flexible workingallows staff to choose bus times that suit them.Other initiatives include:• Green electricity to power the building - PIR isinstalled throughout and low energy bulbs are fittedwherever possible.• Offices equipped with second hand furniture andfittings.• Waste reduction achieved by removing individuals' binsand providing communal bins for paper, plastics, cans,cardboard, and glass to be recycled.• All reference books, publications, and toys for thecustomer play area were sourced second hand viacharity shops and Amazon.• Office cleaning undertaken by local provider Ecoclean -whose staff walk to the office.• Provision of cycle storageto encourage reduction inwork mileage by car.• Incentives for stafftravelling to work by bikeand car share.• Reduced business travel bythe introduction of videoconferencing betweenother Group offices.• Recycling of tonercartridges via the group scheme."We are making serious efforts to minimise our impact on theenvironment and we are proud of how much we did toachieve exactly that when opening our Swindon headquarterslast year.”David Ashmore, Greensquare Group chief executiveAnd the financial benefits of the green office……In terms of financial benefits the use of second-handfurniture, and the minimal building modifications savedaround £146,000.The video conferencing is on target tosave 30,000 business miles and £26,000 per year.Theequipment costs for depreciation and maintenance are£10,700 per year; therefore the net cost saved is£17, 000.The mileage saved is equivalent to 8.6 tonnesof CO2 per year.www.cih.org your work is our business
POINTSWEST Greener Homes5Retrofit - Too Expensiveor the Way Forward to Reduce CO2 Emissions?More than a quarter of all the UK’s carbondioxide emissions come from homes and thegovernment plans to cut carbon emissions by80 per cent by 2050.To achieve this, many organisations are looking at retrofittinghouses to lower carbon. To meet the targets of a 31%reduction in CO2 by 2020 and 80% by 2050, 25 millionexisting homes will need to be refurbished to low carbonlevels.Solar Photo Voltaic (PV) TechnologySolar PV technology is particularly well suited to a large scaleroll out by local authorities and housing associations becausethey have access to a large housing stock and low cost finance.They are likely to be able to benefit from the feed-in tariff forits full 25 year life, unlike most homeowners who will moveduring this time. Landlords will be able to secure an additionalincome stream through the generation and export tariffs,whilst occupants will benefit from smaller energy bills or evenfree green electricity.Plans to retrofit over 25,000 homes in the SW withPV TechnologyAdvantage South West LLP (ASW), an award winning centralpurchasing body is planning to install PV technology into25,000 social housing homes across the South West of Englandby March 2012.This contract is being awarded in March 2011and is a leading example of a retrofit project in our region.ASW’s Members recognise that the majority of the housingstock benefits from its location in the South West of England,where the highest levels of output from PV modules providean enhanced opportunity for the applicants to maximise theirreturn.Advantage South West LLP (Advantage SW) is a limitedliability partnership owned by four Registered Providers. Ithas formed a “central purchasing body” which arrangescontracts that Registered Providers and local authoritiescan access. Seventeen organisations are currently membersof Advantage SW.Retrofitting Homes inNorth DevonNorth Devon Homes (NDH) has retrofitted twouniversal Pre-Reinforced Concrete properties (PRC) withpoor thermal properties and inadequate heating with agrant from the Energy Action Trust for innovativesolutions to energy reduction.The scheme was designed to PassivHaus standards whichrequired a 10-fold reduction in space heating andconsiderable reduction in lighting, cooking, hot water andappliance demands for energy and air tightness.“We used difficult projects so we could accurately assessproblems and review the obstacles that needed to beovercome to achieve the PassivHaus standard.This projectacted as a springboard to inform our general replacementprogrammes and to review costs.”Ed Kennedy, North Devon HomesHeating and InsulationTraditional models tend to look at replacement cycles tosimilar standards driven by cost constraints.When welooked at this approach it became clear that it was alsoabout sequence of works - if you replace the heatingbefore the insulation you restrict both the type of systemyou can use and also may have to specify a higherperformance system to cope with heat loss. If you insulatefirst the opposite is true, the existing heating will also becheaper to run due to the increased insulation.This is awin, win situation as the tenant gets much smaller heatingbills, carbon is reduced and fuel poverty is addressed.This of course is only part of the picture; betterspecification of windows, air tightness, control of airchanges and passive system further reduce energy usageat minimal additional cost to the landlord and reducedenergy costs to the resident.The cumulative effects cancome close to PassivHaus standards, just maybe not inone go.And the results?As a result of this project, NDH have specified substantialupgrades to other PRC properties.This refurbishmentprogramme of 25 units commences in March 2011.Thecosts are well within the predicted costs even with theincreased specificationProperty upgrades include:• increased insulation• high efficiency heating• increased air tightness• high performance windows• controlled ventilation• low energy lighting• photovoltaic panels where suitable• new bathrooms and kitchens with water savingfeatures, including showers etc.www.cih.org your work is our business
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Points West - Chartered Institute of Housing

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