Jon Barrett

In the developed world, how we construct and live in our buildings accounts for almost half of our overall carbon emissions. But we could significantly reduce our domestic carbon footprint if all our housing stock were adequately insulated and efficiently heated.

Of course it is not always quite as simple as that if you happen to live in sub-standard council housing or rent an unmodernised Victorian terrace from a private landlord whose main interest is maximising the profits from their buy-to-let portfolio.

And even if you do own your home – or at least that part of it not covered by a mortgage – the cost of ground source heat pumps, solar electric panels and roof-top wind generators might not be within your income range – and in any case may not seem to justify their expense in terms of energy bill savings or carbon emissions averted.

But there are many simple things that we can all do to substantially reduce our utility bills and make our houses less wasteful of energy. And since it is anticipated that 80% of current housing stock will still be in use in 2050, it is crucial that we make our existing homes - and how we live in them - much more energy-efficient.

It has recently been estimated that it will cost an average of £15,000 per house to achieve our national carbon reduction targets. This is of course beyond most of our budgets but most of us have barely yet begun even to think about the cheap and easy measures that we can achieve.  

The first thing is to stop giving our houses TV inspired cosmetic makeovers and throwing out the black granite worktops because they are so 1990’s now. We need to regard our homes as the assets that they really are – not commodities from which to make an annual gain, but the places where we make our lives – the basic source of our physical shelter and psychological security amidst an interacting community of neighbours.

My own eco-building experience is mainly in conversions of traditional and historic buildings. So the less familiar renewable materials like hemp that I highlight here are not suitable for every application. But it is worth exploring the range of natural building and insulation materials and methods that are increasingly available as alternatives to the carbon-heavy concrete, brick and breezeblock that we automatically tend to use to ‘improve’ our homes.

 

(Links to some useful eco-retrofitting websites follow the pictures below)

 

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INSULATED & BREATHING HEMP/LIME FLOOR

 

HEMP/LIME PLASTER INSULATED WALLS

 

HEMP, LIME & CLAY PARTITION WALLS

 

LINKS

Eco Retrofitting

The Yellow House – http://www.theyellowhouse.org.uk/

Donnachadh McCarthy – http://www.cix.co.uk/~dmccarthy/mygreenhouse.html

Ecovation (Eco-Renovating) - http://ecovation.org.uk/

Penney Poyser – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ATpxabVmvc

Green Building Forum – http://www.newbuilder.co.uk/forum/welcome.asp

Energy Saving Trust – http://www.energysavingtrust.org.uk/

Natural Paints – http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2009/feb/09/eco-natural-paints-guide-best

 

Hemp, Lime & Clay

Steve Allin – http://www.hempbuilding.com/

Hemplime Construction Products Association – http://www.hemplime.org.uk/

Studio MGM Architects (Ralph Carpenter) - http://www.studiomgm.co.uk/hemp.htm

Sustain and Build Video – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FcctSvVFheA&feature=related

Building Limes Forum – http://www.buildinglimesforum.org.uk/

Sustainable Build UK – http://www.sustainablebuild.co.uk/UsingLime.html

Becky Little and Alison Davie – http://www.littleanddavie.co.uk/about.htm

Devon Earth Building Association – http://www.devonearthbuilding.com/

Katy Bryce & Adam Weissman – http://www.cobincornwall.com/

Kevin McCabe Cob Building – http://www.buildsomethingbeautiful.com/

Making Cob video – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2i1cHHJAguA&feature=related