Retrofit Scheme Needs Tradesmen With Green Energy Skills

A multimillion pound project has begun to improve the energy efficiency of Britain's homes.

The Energy Technologies Institute (ETI) has been tasked with developing 'mass-scale' energy efficient technologies for the majority of Britain's 26 million homes which will help the nation meet its 2050 carbon reduction targets.

ETI is starting the two-year scheme to investigate ways to speed up the refurbishment and retrofitting of existing residential properties with green technologies.

The public private partnership will research how to encourage more tradesmen to take green energy courses in order to have the skills necessary to install such renewable technology.

There will also be research into how to stimulate demand from homeowners for energy efficient appliances which will create the challenge of building supply-chains and delivery routes that consumers consider trustworthy and affordable.

Housing is the biggest contributor to Britain's carbon dioxide emissions so the government views retrofitting existing homes as an essential initiative to assist its aim of reducing CO2 by 80 per cent for 2050.

The Department of Energy and Climate Change has said that a city around the size of Cambridge will need to be made energy efficient each and every week by 2020 in order to meet the 2050 targets.

Dr David Clarke, ETI chief executive, said: "Refurbishing these houses with energy efficiency measures is key to ensuring the delivery of affordable and sustainable energy to domestic and business consumers.

"With the majority of today's 26 million dwellings expected to still be in use by 2050, the outputs from this ambitious project are absolutely critical to understanding how we can help meet the CO2 reduction targets as set out in the Climate Change Act."

Tradesmen will be given the skills on green energy courses to retrofit homes with the latest technologies such as air and ground source heat pumps and solar appliances while providing minimum disruption to a house.

The government's Chief Construction Adviser Paul Morrell welcomed the launch of the initiative claiming that it would make an essential contribution to achieving the 2050 targets.

He said: "This is way beyond the scale of anything attempted before, and it calls for a response from the industry that addresses that scale whist acknowledging that, to its occupier, every home is uniquely valuable."

The ETI will be led by BRE (Building Research Establishment) in partnership with energy companies EDF Energy, Peabody, PRP, Total Flow, UCL and Wates.

Action on CO2 has stated that climate change will affect the intensity of extreme weather and have potentially disastrous results for Britain.

by: Martin Hofschroer

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