so the uk govt want all homes to be carbon zero by 2016 (eg here: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/6176229.stm)

however, looking at the ‘Code for Sustainable Homes’ (here: http://www.planningportal.gov.uk/uploads/code_for_sustainable_homes_techguide.pdf doesn’t seem to mention anything about 2016, despite being published in oct 08 – news item is from 06…

can anyone tell me if this is voluntary (as the code seems to suggest) or mandatory???

apologies if i am missing something totally obvious… i’m so bogged down with an essay i’m writing on this i’m just getting confused…

thanks!!

no? 🙁

I am currently studying energy for my masters at city university (London – islington).

The zero carbon homes ploicy stems from a commitment the chancellor (then Gordon Brown) made in 2006 for ‘zero carbon’ homes within ten years (i.e. by 2016). At the time this was far away enough to be Ok and is what is called an ‘aspirational target’ i.e. know one how on earth we are going to do it but the very act of setting it inspires everyone to somehow find a way of meeting it. It is true to say the building trade still have not got a clue of how they are going to do it.

I’m confused too. The implication from the article is that in order to meet the requirement, a house has to be basically disconnected from mains electric and gas supplies, since as soon as either of these are used then you’re no longer carbon neutral. Am I misunderstanding what the article is saying, is the article incorrect, or do they really have such a ludicrous aim?

ahh yes I know this one, if Labour stay in power the recession will get worse, the uk will go bankrupt, all of our houses will be reposessed by our countries creditors, taken down brick by brick and replaced by tents, there, all houses carbon zero. Easy that . . . erm I think!

wine does funny things with your mind and thoughts doesnt it?! 😀

lol @ oxboy…

chrism, the disconnection from the grid is one of the contested areas of the decision. the govt say that there needs to be microgeneration on the site of the dwelling or development and/or off-site generation with a direct link to the development, which is not connected to the grid. for this to happen there needs to be a solid contract in place. it raises the issue of developers having to become energy producers, or energy producers becoming developers. which is obviously a bit daft. some of the stuff i’ve looked at has been quite critical of this. bioregional (who played a part in the bedZED project (medium size, off grid carbon zero development)) have some interesting stuff on it.

so aw, is it something the govt think they HAVE to do? i’ve seen quite a bit on how the building industry isn’t/won’t be ready, and if this is the case, will things just not be completed? i saw another document suggesting the code for sustainable housing was enforceable at the local planners discretion…

i’ve no idea 🙁

the government set a goal, the government haven’t got a clue, expect it to be abandoned in the not to distant future. Part of the issue is the government haven’t defined carbon neutral yet.

If all politicians were rendered carbon neutral we wouldn’t have this problem, but then where would we get hot air from?

look at industry sites like:
Building
Architects Journal
Building Design
AECB
RIBA
there’s plenty of stuff about this out there, and plenty of information about the problems with building Code5 and beyond and about the issues with microgeneration (ie its not worth it).
Sorry bit terse but out in 20 minutes.
ps we’re currently on site with 24 Code5 units.

‘Part of the issue is the government haven’t defined carbon neutral yet. ‘
well, in terms of the housing, i believe that the definition is a house where, when in use, the house emits no carbon – i.e. no footprint from its heating, lighting, cooking etc etc etc, but doesn’t include the building, ir activities done by the residents outside the house, such as transport. it also has to have its own private (almost) power supply from renewables (CHP, wind, solar etc)

aP, thanks for those, i’ll have a look. i’ve got quite a bit of good literature about the subject fortunately, unfortunatly i just can’t work out exactly what the govt are saying – they HAVE to do it by law/legislation OR its voluntary/up to the local councils planning office etc…

Carbon neutral means that a house can have a grid connection but also microgeneration technologies installed. Any amount of imported energy from the grid has to be matched over time by onsite generated electricity (including that exported to the grid).

EST’s Pathway beyond zero carbon homes is useful;

EST Linky

You need to read the UKGBC consultation reports on definitions of Zero Carbon.
http://www.ukgbc.org/site/resources/showResourceDetails?id=180

The code is currently entirely voluntary. However, as often happens voluntary measures become regulated after an initial testing/bedding in period.

Except in Wales where all houses planned after 1st April 2009 have to meet Level 3. So its a regulatory requirement enforceable by LA Planning Depts.

Also Wales has an aspiration target of zerocarbon newbuild homes by 2011! Though is this case aspirational target can probably be read as ministerial slip.

For your essay it might be useful to note how the Code reinforces/extends other regulatory regimes such as Site Waste management Plans, bits of the Building Regs and flood risk planning.

Jonny

Also on Building mag forum there is an interesting discussion between global sustainable construction bigwigs, David Strong, Che Wall and the US equivalent.
In here somewhere.

Building like a german “Passivhaus” is probably what they are aiming for.
Passivhaus
But this page shows how the current regs lag behind
UK comparison

hi, thanks for the additional info. i’ll have a good look around this evening. unfortunately i have to edit another essay, tidy my house for council inspectors and landlord, and find flights to tajikistan before i get back to this essay…

i had another look on the planningportal site (linked in my first post) for the definition of carbon zero house, its on page 46 of that document. i’ve posted the relevant bit below…

‘Where net carbon dioxide emissions resulting from
ALL energy used in the dwelling are zero or better.
This includes the energy consumed in the operation
of the space heating/cooling and hot-water systems,
ventilation, all internal lighting cooking and all electrical
appliances, these are now dealt with under Section 14
SAP 2005 extension for SDLT. The calculation can take
account of contributions from onsite renewable/low
carbon installations. Zero Carbon homes with the Code
can also take advantage of the allowance with Section
14 to omit the requirement for secondary heating where
applicable.
Off-site renewable contributions can only be used where
these are directly supplied to the dwellings by private
wire arrangement.’

that seems to imply its off the national grid???

thanks!!

So it really is as ridiculous as I thought! Whoever came up with this one doesn’t have two braincells to rub together – whatever is wrong with coming up with a practical and useful target which people might actually attempt to meet?

To confuse matters further you should also look at the Strategy for Sustainable Construction 2008 which again sets lots of high level targets with little intention to produce new legislation.

However, there are lots of links to the CSH and you can see where other existing bits of regulation overlap with the code.

See the Good Homes Alliance site, the AECB site and the Green Building Forum for more.

Lets also be clear you can have a carbon neutral house in use, that uses huge amounts of energy in use and has used a pile of energy and resources to make.

Code for Sustainable Homes is NOT voluntary – you have to set a level, but there is no prescribed level for most as yet. If you are a social housing provider, or have social housing as part of a development (more usual) you need to meet CSH level 3 at present, due to rise to CSH 4 next year.

By 2012 all new buildings will be upto CSH 4, social housing upto CSH 5.

There are only 32(ish) CSH 5+ projects actually certified and finished in the UK as of March 2009. There are very few who are actually monitoring energy, temperature, humidity and water use (see the Good Homes Alliance site for this). Ours are 8) .

‘Carbon Zero’ is not carbon zero, and is a pipedream IMHO. Carbon Zero is only the ‘tied down’ energy (heat, lights, water heating and white goods), not things like Pc’s, hairdryers, alarms, standard lamps etc etc etc etc. So in fact a CSH 5-6 house will only in reality be a 40-50% reduction in energy terms – carbon may be different. The step change to achieve this all is massive – many buildings claim to be sustainable / CSH level something / Carbon Zero etc etc, but few actually do in reality. This is a big issue.

We have CSH 3,4 and 5 projects up, with embodied energy, build costs etc up and published on the GHA site, and forthcoming.

Code for Sustainable Homes case studies – LABC from Matt Robinson

I also forgot to say that CSH is changing, my boss chairs the group looking at the changes and the new 2010 building regs, and we are also involved in the new SAP calculations due for 2010 that are likely to be more like PHPP….

All in all, if you are anything to do with construction, a revolution is 20 years overdue and about to hit you in 2010….

thanks again guys 🙂 i’ll be having a real good read through of all this, and the links shortly…

😀

I think I get the gist of this carbon neutral thing (carbon input v output).

Ok, What about the inhabitants? Do we have to have enough plant life on the premises to balance out the CO2 we produce when breathing? Seriously, people produce CO2 as well. The output increases exponentially when we exercise, so should cyclists have to grow more plants?

I am of course playing devil’s advocate, but wish to draw attention to the fact that we are subjected to a lot of hot air (groan) about this topic.

Most of us are striving to reduce carbon emissions (to save on paying out too much for gas, vehicle fuel and electricity). It would be a lot easier if we had better engineered homes. It will take many decades to significantly change this, if ever. We need to give people an incentive.

The two biggest sources of pollution are from heating our homes and driving cars. If you want to save fossil fuels, these are the two main areas to focus on.

Currently, any equipment providing alternative sources of energy are ridiculously inflated. The period it takes to recover the outlay if you have all this gear installed professionally is 10 years (according to my central heating engineer mate). Is there anything radical about a roof mounted heat exchanger, or a simple windmill turbine? Not really, but in the latter case there is a need for battery storage of this energy. Batteries are expensive and don’t last forever. I do wonder what the environmental impact these have when they are disposed of. I think that wind energy isn’t viable (especially on calm days). The impact on the landscape is pretty unacceptable too.

The only way to really get people to take this pollution thing seriously is to inflate the price of fuel to the point where it hurts having a fossil fuel wasting product. Only his would motivate us to radically change. We saw a little bit of this last summer when fuel prices went through the roof.

Americans have a much larger wastage of fossil fuels per head of population than anywhere else in the world. This is down to everything being too big; vehicle engines, houses, distances travelled etc etc etc. Houses aren’t insulated well and then there is the issue of airconditioning – many Americans have AC in their homes. AC uses 3 times as much energy to cool a room as a boiler takes to heat a room. Imagine what it would be like if we had to cool our UK homes throughout the summer months? We pay vastly more than the Americans do for energy. If they were on the same tariffs as us, they’d go bust!

IMHO the prime solution for regulating temperatures in buildings starts with insulation.

I have been conscious of the environmental damage of our unsustainable lifestlye is doing since it was drummed into us at school 40 years ago will continue to try to persuade the rest of the population, but the cynic in me says that it won’t change until we are hit hard in the pocket.

Whatever we do as individuals, there will always be a need to produce energy. I think nuclear energy is our best option. Nuclear power plants that are owned, engineered and staffed by British people. What a naive notion!

spongebob, i totally agree with a lot of that.

if all houses built by 2016 are carbon zero (using the definition i posted above) then its a starting point. but its still a flawed concept. there are so many issues with it, not just the technology, but the timescales and how its being done and definied. insulation is one of the key principals in the uk, and these carbon zero houses do need a lot of it. the barratt homes model, which they are now building, has a high thermal mass, triple glazing, plenty of insulation etc etc etc. its a step forward at least.

i don’t agree with the energy provision plans. i believe a far better option is to allow off-site electricity generation, open to the grid. micro-generation does have some things going for it, in the right place though. CHP – whereby heat created by generating electricity is used to heat homes etc is a good thing, as long as the fuel used is clean (i.e. landfill gas, biomass etc). CHP generators can achieve 70-80% energy efficiency, which is pretty darn good when compared to 30% from trad coal power stations…

having green new homes is great, but already the vast majority of the future housing stock is already built, so, imo, the govt should be concentrating on helping people make their current homes green.

and as you say, until the cost is just too great, few people will really do anything about it. one of the problems these new carbon zero developments will face, according to some in the industry, is that they are more expensive than the standard houses, and therefore will be more difficult to sell… it’ll require a certain type of house buyer to buy them – one who is content to spend the extra to have a carbon zero house.

FWIW my essay is largly a criticism of the concept, i’m writing about why the govt plans won’t be met…
(although on principal, i do agree with it)

Just think what elegant, sustainable and cheap to run homes we could all have if they pull their fingers out and get on with this stuff.

I took our ISO14001 group around The Green Shop recently, to check out their new building. Wow, they have got it sorted. Only 3 air changes an hour, little need for lighting, a PV array that creates more than they need, master on/off switches in all the rooms, green roofs, brown roofs, rainwater harvesting, and their heating is all done by solar hot water and burning pallets by the blingest computer controlled german wood burner I’ve seen. Plus they make an income from it as they are using a renewable fuel!

It all works and looks so logically practical when you see it – not the alledged anti-hippy “we’ll all have to live in caves etc. etc. yawn” BS many are fed.

Simple things like having a lime wash on the outside to let the building breathe. Common practice up until about 100 years ago apparently, when people started thinking it’s easier just to use cheap energy to force the moisture out of the walls. Yep, brute force engineering – we love it.

Microgeneration is an interesting subject.

I have heard about heat reclamation whereby you bury pipes in the garden. This produces enough heat to keep a house at a comfortable temperature, but you need a big plot without an established garden.

Geothermal energy sounds like a great way of heating homes. If people could get a local consortium together, this sort of method could become viable, but costs are very high indeed. Maybe this is one area for the politicians, but then GAs and electricys companies aren’t going to get behind this. I believe a lot of opportunities for alternative energy sources are held back by oil companies. They own a lot of patents and have good lawyers.

At a smaller scale, Solar panels to heat hot water are also of interest. My mate installs these and he reckons you get piping hot water, even on cloudy days. Roofs need reinforcement and installation must be on a south facing side. A tricky install and I would worry about frost and the potential subsequent water damage.

In all cases, unless you are into a specialised new build, it’s not really viable.

the roof top solar pannels dont freeze as theyr cpnstructed like a greenhouse, so theres a transtparrent casing over them keeping them seperate from the cold air. But lettign the sun in to heat the water in the balck tubes.

not exactly piping hot, but usualy hot enough to run into the bath, or more usualy heated up by the boiler and used like you normaly would hot water.

Spongebob – do some research, please. 🙄

Pipes in garden = Ground source heat pumps. If you are off gas, they rock. If you are on, they emit more carbon and cost more to install and run.

Geothermal = a multitude of options, including GSHP above, or drilling for the earths core.

Solar thermal is good, can work well, but usually only provides a proportion of domestic hot water. Freezing is not a problem – I suspect the fact that they have been used for over 30 years on the continent in freezing conditions may have something to do with this. Roofs do not always need re-enforcing.

In all cases, unless you are into a specialised new build, it’s not really viable.

Biggest pile of bollocks statement I have heard in a long time. Please stop.

Yes I know how solar panels are made (I made one as a technology project 30 years ago), but when covered in snow over an extende period, the water inside could freeze. As could the pipes that carry water too and from this panel. Of course, there is the matter of the whole thing heating up and cooling every day which must surely increase the potential for a leak failure. If you have ever had water pouring through a ceiling and seen the damage it can do, you would understand my concern.

‘In all cases, unless you are into a specialised new build, it’s not really viable.’

perhaps, but these are some of the technologies which will probably be used in large scale carbon zero house build projects. imo CHP is a good thing, and i believe its where money and development should be going, certainly for new projects. BUT the emphasis from the govt on on-site/private elec production is, imo, daft. some energy production methods are far better if they are on a large scale, so why stop these developments tapping into them??

ground-source heatpumps are the ones with the pipe in the ground iirc, and afaik they produce reasonable amounts of heat. imo we need to return to having high thermal mass houses, they keep cool in summer and keep warm in winter – earthships take the concept to the extreme. the issue though is that a lot of high thermal mass houses use concrete, which itself is pretty damagin to the environment. lime-cement, similar to that oo00oo said, seems a viable alternative, which apparently absorbes C over time – making it carbon negative (apparently).

the govt do seem keen on photovoltaic cell solar panels, however i was under the impression that the manufacturing of them was pretty harmful. certainly the water heating ones are a viable and sustainable tech though.

there’s a lot that can be done out there, but i think it comes down to what developers can put in, at a price point – they’re not going to go over and above any govt specifications purely because the costs to them are going to be too high. i guess with the growth of the carbon zero industry, tech will become cheaper in the future. as the uk is one of the first countries to have such a policy (or whatever it is), its been said that there is the potential for the uk to become world leaders in carbon zero tech, and that the industry will soon be worth £2 bill per year. i just dunno if i believe we’ll get there though… certainly not for a while at least.

imo the lead in changing and developing tech radically will have to come from some very brave self-builds and the companies who supply those builds… because whatever greenwashing barratt etc want to put out there, they’re building houses to make profit, NOT to save the environment…

barratt’s carbon zero house

bedZED carbon zero community, UKs largest carbon zero development so far

aw – would be intrested knowing more about your dissertation – what angle are you coming at it from?

Modern thermal solar uses evacuated tubes and the recovery medium isn’t water.
I think that things may have changed since 1978, as even CAT would admit. I can remember going there in 76? when they had 3 old houses which they’d started to adapt, some rather shonky windmills and the best bit – a jerrycan with a funnel into which you peed.

Spongebob – Member

Yes I know how solar panels are made (I made one as a technology project 30 years ago), but when covered in snow over an extende period, the water inside could freeze. As could the pipes that carry water too and from this panel. Of course, there is the matter of the whole thing heating up and cooling every day which must surely increase the potential for a leak failure. If you have ever had water pouring through a ceiling and seen the damage it can do, you would understand my concern.

Oh please stop. Please do some research, not a 30 year old technology project.

For a start, most panels have antifreeze in. Then they have a flow back feature on some to remove water when the panels are cold. Then you can get a panel that has no water other than in the head manifold, which is mega insulated, and has antifreeze in and may also have flow-back feature. And if a panel is covered in snow, it is effectively insulated to within couple of degrees of freezing, far better than in a heavy frost.

Solar thermal (DHW) works if you can generate enough heat to kill off bugs in your system.
Heat pumps generally work at lower temp & best with under floor heating with buildings of high thermal mass.

RE CSH, optional, not a regulatory requirement such as Building Regs (which part L being revised again next year). The Government appear to be walking away from CSH possibly due to it’s heavy nature.

Good way to achieve zero carbon is air tight ligthwt structure no heating mech vent with heat recovery with solar hot water pump driven off PV. It does of course all still require leccy.

hungry monkey – bedzed is NOT carbon zero, and barrats house is struggling to deliver on its claims.

Also work out that thermal mass is a totally separate issue from heat source, although the buildings response and physics will affect spec and control and effectiveness of a heatsource.

The Government appear to be walking away from CSH possibly due to it’s heavy nature.

No they are not, they are totally re writing it. I just spent a morning looking through a draft of the rewrite.

i realise barratt may well have difficulties… perhaps they houses will comply to govt definitions of C zero, perhaps not… but imo they seem to be reducing pollution to a point, and moving the sources of pollution around. (ok, that might not make sense in writing).

bedZED is meant to be C zero, no? says to on their site (ok, i know people say things they want people to believe). their CHP generator isn’t working at the mo thanks to tar build up in the engine, so they are on grid at the mo – is that what you are referring to? if not, could you tell me how they are not? i’m about to write a section on bedZED, so would be good to know 🙂

i know thermal mass doesn’t equal heat source, but as a whole system, thermal mass helps regulate temperature passively.

hungry monkey – many people claim to be carbon zero, few manage it.

Bedzed has never functioned properly, and never will. The CHP/boiler has not functioned properly for years. Where does the energy come from for the CHP unit at BedZed? Biomass…and biomass is not (usually) carbon neutral.

I also forgot to mention (in relation to BedZed) the fact that it difficult to access public transport from the site (A higher proportion of BZD households own cars compared to Londonium average).

Also look up the Brookes-Kahzoom effect, again some of the study was done on BedZed.

‘many people claim to be carbon zero, few manage it.’
i realise that.

‘The CHP/boiler has not functioned properly for years. Where does the energy come from for the CHP unit at BedZed? Biomass…and biomass is not (usually) carbon neutral.’

aye, the tar build up has preveted it from working. BUT that doesn’t mean CHP as a whole won’t work. i can’t quite find the document on where they got the fuel from, but iirc it was locally from tree surgeon waste. so not all that bad. other fuels for CHP could be carbon zero, or at least low carbon, such as landfill gas etc. (yes, there’s the argument that the waste has been created in the first place etc)

i think its easy to see though that there is no easy answer to the problems of carbon emissions though. nothing is perfect. imo there is nothing wrong therefore, with trying to get as perfect as currently possible.
even if bedZED isn’t/hasn’t/won’t work, the fact that it has been tried shows that there is room for development, and perhaps bedZED is just part of a longer term evolution of the concept – learn from mitakes and all that…

Oh dear.

I just got ‘sucked in’

Lets put it this way – with all this carbon focussed boll*cks we are trying to ‘fly’ before we can walk, run or jump. And all this bickering over energy solutions is a reflection of the mis-information and lack of strategy within the UK at the moment.

Bottom line is, most of our houses are Model T fords (with a new lick of paint), the new ones are Ford Anglias and within a few years we are all expected to be driving bl**dy hybrid – which is the worng technology anyway….