Sustainable Refurbishment
Wednesday 14 October 2015
5.30pm - 9.00pm
Hosted by
25 Moorgate, London, EC2R 6AY
THIS EVENT CAN QUALIFY FOR CPD POINTS FOR A RANGE OF PROFESSIONAL BODIES. CERTIFICATES OF ATTENDANCE CAN BE PROVIDED ON REQUEST.
According to BRE, nearly one third of UK carbon emissions are from housing. We can and should build new houses to rigorous energy efficiency standards. Yet at current rates of demolition and new build, it will take 1,000 years to completely renew the UK housing stock – so most of the homes standing today will still be in use in 2050.
The sudden termination of the Zero Carbon Homes 2016 policy and the Green Deal this summer, together with the continued economic squeeze, have emphasised the importance of maintaining and upgrading our existing building stock to an improved environmental standard.
The challenge is to refurbish the buildings of the past as buildings for the future. How do landlords, facilities managers, tenants, builders, homeowners and housing managers decide what needs to be done and how it should be achieved? What are the costs, the paybacks, the technical constraints? How should they weigh up the environmental impacts of materials, water and energy use?
A performance gap has been identified between how some newly refurbished properties operate and what was expected. Behaviour specialists identify specific issues which mean that an improved quality of living is expected by the occupants after the project is completed and so the new running costs and environmental benefits are sometimes less beneficial than hoped. However, some technologies have also not performed as well as expected. What has been learnt so far and what are the real figures that can be relied upon when a refurbishment decision is being made?
There are many instances when demolition and rebuild will be considered as an alternative to refurbishment. This could be justified purely on economic grounds, or the advantages offered by a new building could be considered to justify the extra cost. However, two non-economic factors should be considered:
1. The environmental impact of refurbishment versus new build
2. The socio-economic impact.
Initially, the environmental impact of refurbishment will almost always be less than demolition and new build. This is because all the materials carry embodied energy – to replace them causes new carbon emissions. Furthermore, the demolition process and waste disposal creates carbon emission as well as other waste disposal impacts. It is often argued that a new building will operate at higher energy performance than a refurbished one, and that during its lifetime, may have less environmental impact. Two important effects should be considered – that new build is only the lowest emitter after the break-even time period, and that this period can be extended by improved performance of the refurbished option. Also, if the break-even time is beyond the time of the environmental crisis (or emission reduction target), the life-cycle emission is irrelevant and the refurbished building is the best choice. It is also evident that the break-even point is sensitive to the actual performance of the buildings; new buildings have not in general performed as well as predicted and this will postpone the break-even point.
This event will take a good hard look at sustainable refurbishment, what it really means, what the practical experiences have been, how sustainable refurbishment has been financed and what the investor perspectives are, what the building industry is actively doing to push this agenda and what homeowners and tenants are looking for from newly refurbished buildings today.
Evening Agenda:
5.30pm Registration
6.00pm Welcome: Andrew Bond, Smith & Williamson
6.10pm Introduction: Clive Hall, Rushlight Events
6.15pm Overview of Sustainable Refurbishment - Richard Lupo, Senior Sustainability Consultant, Sustainable Homes. His presentation is HERE.
6.40pm Analysing the technology alternatives - Russell Smith, Managing Director, Parity Projects. His presentation is HERE.
7.10pm Panel discussion and Q&A, augmented by
Bruno Gardner - Managing Director, Low Carbon Workplace, Carbon Trust
Bevan Jones - Sustainability Manager, Catalyst Housing
Paul Davies - Sustainable Technologies Manager, Wates Living Space
8.00pm Networking and drinks
9.00pm Close
Who should attend?
Architects, architectural technologists, sustainability professionals, surveyors, interior designers, property investment and fund managers, estates and facilities managers, property developers, builders, investors, analysts, corporate financial advisors, financiers, advisers and other followers of the market.
REGISTRATION
Each delegate place costs £35 + VAT and places are strictly limited.
To register click HERE
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SPEAKERS
Bruno Gardner - Managing Director, Low Carbon Workplace, Carbon Trust
Bruno heads up the Carbon Trust’s involvement in the Low Carbon Workplace, a low-carbon property development partnership between the Carbon Trust, asset manager Columbia Threadneedle and developer Stanhope. The partnership acquires commercial office buildings and refurbishes them into modern, energy-efficient workplaces. Tenants receive ongoing support from the Carbon Trust, helping them to minimise their energy costs and carbon emissions. Bruno also leads the Carbon Trust’s work on sustainable cities. In his previous role as Director of Energy Efficiency Ventures, Bruno oversaw the Carbon Trust’s commercial energy efficiency and implementation activities, including the Energy Efficiency Financing partnership with Siemens Financial Services and the Carbon Trust Green Business Directory for accredited equipment suppliers. Before joining the Carbon Trust, Bruno worked as a strategy consultant for McKinsey and held various commercial, strategic and operational roles with ExxonMobil and Barclays. Bruno holds a Master’s degree in Mechanical Engineering and an MBA.
Richard Lupo - Senior Sustainability Consultant, Sustainable Homes
Richard is a Chartered Environmentalist and Full Member of the Institute of Environmental Management and Assessment (IEMA). At Sustainable Homes he has carried out over 50 full sustainability assessments of social landlords using the SHIFT standard. He has also facilitated the design of housing stock energy efficiency improvement strategies using the CROHM format. Other consultancy work includes calculating and making recommendations for improvement of office carbon emissions and business fleet emissions. In addition, he is an experienced Code for Sustainable Homes assessor. He has trained and qualified over 300 Code for Sustainable Homes assessors as well as trained building professionals on Housing Quality Indicators and sustainable refurbishment. At Imperial College London, he developed a waste silt recycling process, gained an MSc in Environmental Engineering and studied the impact of new regulations on hazardous waste disposal.
Russell Smith – Managing Director, Parity Projects
Russell founded Parity in 2005 whilst carrying out his own deep eco-renovation – work which inspired the later development of the our renowned Home Energy Masterplan and CROHM stock assessment advice services. He is a fellow of the Centre of Refurbishment Excellence, serves on the Buildings Working Group of the Green Construction Board, and is a Director of RetrofitWorks co-operative.
Bevan Jones - Sustainability Manager, Catalyst Housing Ltd
Bevan is the Group Sustainability Manager for Catalyst responsible for implementing sustainability strategy and bespoke projects. He has contributed to a number of local and national studies including ‘Closing the Performance Gap - End of Term Report’ with the Zero Carbon Hub. Prior to this he was a Senior Consultant with Ecofys gaining extensive climate change adaptation experience and advising clients on adaptation and resilience within their business. before that he was Climate Change Adaptation Officer/Low Carbon Partnerships Officer at the London Borough of Islington.
Paul Davies - Sustainable Technologies Manager, Wates Living Space
Paul is the Sustainable Technologies Manager for Wates Living Space and has recently been overseeing the delivery of the AGMA Green Deal & ECO programme, to deliver energy efficiency improvements into private housing in the North West of England. He has led on a number of research projects focussed in the retrofit of the existing housing stock, including TSB Scaling Up Retrofit, ETI improving thermal efficency of the existing stock and nine of the TSB’s Retrofit for the future projects. He is also a board member of Energiesprong UK, a Dutch finance model to improve residential property to a zero net energy standard and finance the improvement from the energy saving. Well-known throughout the industry as an expert on a wide range of environmental issues, Paul has spoken at a number of conferences across the UK including CIH Conference, Cardiff, Capita National Housing Conference, RICS Low Carbon Homes Conference, Zero Carbon Britain workshop, Housing Forum. He is a Director of SHAP – the Sustainable Housing Action Programme and was listed in the Top 50 Green Leaders in the West Midlands, he also contributed to the Zero Carbon Britain 2030 report produced by the CAT.