The 30 Year House - Part 2

 Will government encourage the use of new materials and communication without wires, wifi or Bluetooth that are already appearing on the market?

Will roofs protect against heat waves without using mains power to maintain a healthy population?

In June 2022, the government introduced a new set of regulations for new house builders. They set new standards for ventilation, energy efficiency and heating, and state that new residential buildings must have charging points for electric vehicles.

The Federation of Master Builders says the measures will require new materials, testing methods, products and systems to be installed. Indeed so it will. The price of climate change mitigation is not cheap.

There are new government rules concerning the amount of glazing used in extensions, and any new windows or doors must be highly insulated.” The problem is that the rules will aim to reduce the size of windows that are potentially a source of a lot of solar power.

Some say that walls will have to be thicker in order to comply with requirements for better insulation. Alternatively, new materials may make them thinner but the building sector has not got there yet.

Glazing on windows, doors and roof lights must cover no more than 25% of the floor area to prevent heat loss according to the new regulations which is a rule that has already been superseded.

As properties become more airtight, the regulator says there have to be measures to ensure proper airflow, such as having small openings (trickle vents) on windows that allow ventilation when a window is closed. Tosh! Do the job properly, save the NHS billions with proper air filtration.

For people extending their homes, they may be required to install a new, or replacement, heating system depending on the size of the build and have to use lower temperature water to deliver the same heat, which will require increased insulation of pipes commented insider. Its a big rock for all these ‘experts’ to hide under. Solar water heating is getting really good. Why not use it.

So the government get 5 out of ten for initiative and 2 out of ten for understanding what is needed and possible. It can also be said that technologies are moving so fast that some of these government initiatives are passed before the ink has dried on their parchment.

Meantime we also have to consider the prospect of poor quality housing in a time of fast-expanding populations and accelerating environmental change will be dangerous but also a magnet for disruption by the green-eyed disadvantaged.

In the foreseeable (next 30 years), houses will need to be easily maintained and repurposed in part or whole as technologies emerge. The need and cost of structural maintenance also have to be reduced.

Below is a whole chapter on finance. We have to examine how homes will be fnanced. There will be new forms of finance emerging to unstitch the excesses of builder speculation going back a couple of centuries.

It is not possible to think of a future house in the image of a house being built in 2022 and its close cousin that was built to house 18th-century coal miners.

For more see Climate Change House available from Amazon amzn.to/3RgR4Vf 

The 30 Year House - part 1

A large proportion of our existing homes in the UK are over 50 years old. It follows that modernising and building new homes will require the relevant professions to look into the future.

What will a house look like in 2050?

We have to peer into the future and hope that we are right. What is certain from the COP26 conference (26th UN climate change Conference of the Parties (COP26) Glasgow 2021) is that small steps spell doom.

Go into a modern housing estate. Look up. Are the gutters big? If not, they are not ready for the record-breaking tempests climate change will deliver this year and next. The architect who designs such fixtures should be banned from the Royal Society. Or, perhaps the Royal Institution of Chartered Architects (RICA) should relinquish its Charter status so its members can create rubbish houses without embarrassing the Queen. It is now time to create and build for the future and well beyond the minimum standards introduced by the hosts of COP26, the British Government.

Let’s be certain about this. Restoring, insuring and living in dwellings that are not climate change mitigated is far more expensive than renovating, refurbishing and re-building poorly prepared homes.

It is easy to kick the climate change can down the road but evidence of how it can affect us NOW is frightening but there are some drivers lining up.

The main cause of the 2022 gas price crisis has grown because of the increasing gas demand (organically, following the pandemic) and reduced gas supplies caused by the Ukraine war. Additionally, unseasonably low wind generation in the UK (particularly in September 2021 and the winter of 2022) reduced green energy availability.

Lower pipeline gas flows from Russia to Europe (and other Europeans have similar housing problems and bigger gas supply issues), less storage capacity, and higher carbon prices have focused minds on developing carbon-reduced power. It is a narrow perspective. There is a need for a much wider view of these issues.

The home of the future will need long-term policies to keep the lights on.

My book Climate Change House covered these subjects in greater detail and points to robust research.

Solve NHS manning issues

The second biggest NHS problem is professional manpower.

Fast-evolving diagnosis using AI and automation can provide tangible support to overworked physicians with systems that are designed to minimize stress and increase time spent with patients.

The United Kingdom is behind OECD averages for medical imaging scanners per million population, with much equipment across CT, MRI, PET-CT, X-ray and Ultrasound outdated.  Additionally, there are challenges with space and capacity across existing Trust estates, some of which have become outmoded.

There is a huge range of technologies that can be automated. Many of them can be used in diagnostics.

The big problem is in rolling them out to every community.

The answer is to develop ‘walk-in’ health monitoring, automated diagnosis and triage and NHS phone apps.

From automated cancer diagnosis (now available but very recently for most cancers) to common health checks, such facilities would deploy the most up-to-date technologies with reporting going to the patient, GP and other medical practitioners agreed by the patient.

Once again such centres would be located on high streets to help high-street commerce.

Funding has to come from the NHS Bond.

Fast Track For More Energy

One of the big drivers of inflation is the cost of energy. We need a way of creating more and reducing costs. This is how:

Energy usage is high during the daytime and low at night.  A mechanism to level out this difference would lower the average cost of power and the more we can distance our energy usage from the international cost of energy, the better.

The answer is, of course, storing energy at its lowest price and releasing it at times of peak demand. 

Creating a distributed battery capability is a simple solution.

It does require fast-track government action.

The planning authorities should be mandated to create space for big (ISO container-sized) batteries at or near all electricity transformer sites across the country.

The energy companies will be told that they will avoid a windfall tax to the extent that they install the batteries. They will make a profit by buying electricity at night when it is cheap and will sell it during the day when it is expensive. Sourcing the batteries will have to be from manufacturers with the ability to manufacture in relatively sufficient volume to a standard acceptable to the energy companies.

This will be a five-year contract when they will receive a lump sum for the batteries from any sales they make, in effect a ‘battery investment bond’.

Mechanisms will include 

1. A National Grid scheme to register Big Battery manufacturers as capable to manufacture with TQM quality, and capacity to manufacture, install and make operational at the rate of several units per month.

2. The installations assurance will be by a visit from a qualified engineer paid for by the manufacturer and licenced by the National Grid at the rate £1000 per licence for each manufacturing factory. 

3. Licences will be completed within 20 days of application by the manufacturer and the Grid will face a financial penalty of £10,000 if it fails to comply.

4. This creates a tendency to favour UK manufacturers, create jobs and grow UK manufacturing and hurries up the role out of the scheme.

5. The energy companies subject to a potential windfall tax will manage and pay for the completed manufacture, installation and subsequent operation.

6. These companies will have the windfall tax reduced by a sum of money equivalent to 100% of the cost of battery manufacturing, installation and operational completion (with a Grid contract in place). 

7. Windfall tax reduction will come into effect 30 days after operational execution.

End Bed - Blocking

 

NHS

The NHS and social care need money. The government does not have it. It is a huge part of government expenditure.

The first big problem for hospitals is bed blocking.

The solution is to create ‘convalescent’ accommodations in high streets (to encourage high street footfall, use existing transport infrastructure and encourage friends and relatives to spend with small businesses - a win for local retailers). This would provide accommodation for patients who are ‘bed blocking’ for want of social care.

The capital investment for the convalescent centres project will be funded with new ‘NHS Bonds’ available to the public as well as financial Institutions.  

The capital will be used to convert (nightingale hospital style fast refurbishment) existing high street buildings into the range of beds and accommodation needed. 

The accommodation will also include small retail units providing goods and services that visitors can use plus restaurants/cafes for patients and visitors. 

These will provide revenues to support running costs. Other forms of revenue will come from electricity storage using building energy harvesting and trading in low to high-cost electricity activity using big batteries (which can also provide emergency electricity backup). Patients will also be expected to contribute to their care too.

Income will also have to be independent of the NHS budget and pay interest to bondholders.

Management will be vested in local people and not big conglomerates.

End-of-term NHS Bonds capital will be raised through the sale of leaseholds in the properties.

Lets get vertical and save the planet.

Vertical windmill sculptures are fun but are also a serious subject. Can they be an alternative to the big windmills used in wind farms on land and sea?

What if you turned the idea sideways, and created a turbine that could spin like a carousel? And what if you made a turbine small enough to sit on top of a building or inside an urban park? Could the result produce enough power to really matter? 

In the last two decades, a flurry of interest in expanding renewable energy in cities has attracted the attention of a large number of inventors and artists, many of whom see the vertical axis wind turbine as promising.

There is no single design for these upended wind catchers, but all share one key aspect: the blades turn around an axis that points skyward. 

They are now considered to be an alternative to the big windmills used in wind farms on land and sea. In some cases, they are more productive than the ones you see from the beach.

The size of these windmills varies but they can be rooftop size and offer power generation in the dead of night as well. They can also be attractive too.

How do we fund Climate Change mitigation

 At present I am focused on funding improved policies for mitigating the effects of Climate Change in the housing sector.

In the UK drought and its associated wild fires destroyed houses and increased pressure on the NHS, among other issues.

But such expenditure may well be poorly placed.

The Building Research Establishment shows the annual costs to the NHS of poor quality and hazardous housing at £1.4 billion. This rises to £18.5 billion p.a. when wider societal costs are included (long term care, mental health etc.).

Peter Freeman, the chairman of the government quango Homes England, reports its own investment on behalf of the government. He says “Our partners include Barclays, Lloyds Banking Group and M&G. In March 2020, we announced a £10m investment in M&G Investments new Shared Ownership Fund. Homes England’s early participation catalysed £177m of initial institutional investment, a first step towards the fund’s £825m target capital raised. Over the next five years the fund will develop more than 2,000 new affordable shared ownership homes in partnership with housing associations across England. This deal highlights the commitment Homes England has to supporting the growth and evolution of housing in institutional portfolios.” Are such affordable homes part of new housing estates or monoculture crescents of old peoples?

Call all this money £20/40 billion by including savings to the NHS. Asking the NHS to invest in re-furbished dwellings to save all or part of £1,4 billion is going to be a tough ask but simply implemented.

Filtering air entering a building to remove 99% of particulate from vehicles (a main cause of lung diseases), cold, flu and covid viruses and much more would be a significant investment alongside insulation of roofs, walls and floors and removal of heat bridges. Mitigating Climate Change can also make the nation healthier.

The pledges from the financial institutions have not been included in the above resources and there are also Local Government funds available too.

The 2022 Queen’s Speech promised even more cost to the Treasury and another attempt to add further to the current mish mash of money, regulation ‘incentives’ and Climate Change mitigation (and confusion with global warming).

There is more but it makes the point. There are some dwellings that are of a high standard out of the 24 million homes in the UK but not many.

It seems that there is quite a lot of money floating around to do a stunning job and upgrade our homes against Climate Change. What is silly is that there are large sums of money cast across a lot of homes and therefore of little consequence at the sharp end. People are to a varying degree inspired by this largesse; some even do nothing at all!

There is a case for a comprehensive review of what money is being sloshed around and for what purpose.

Let's look at three examples:

There are other investments that can be included in refurbishment such as electricity saving devices including light bulbs, low power washing machines and solar powered and energy creating street lights. Other forms of cost reduction that can attract funding are estate wide battery storage facilities (of which more later) to keep the lights on at night and offer over capacity power to the National Grid or independent customers. Then there is the use of a local bottled water company selling estate harvested water. Providing automated street services such as lighting, street cleaning and grass cutting etc. has a value too and can attract funding. All these stakeholder provided services can be bundled up into a package that can be valuable investments and funded and managed by the private sector and will also help to slim down tax payer funded government.

The Public Private Partnership scheme whereby financial institutions fund capital assets and services are wide open to abuse and can be restructured to support the housing crisis.

Tracing the path of taxpayers, financial institutions and revenue streams in the housing sector needs to be closely managed. It needs the security and real life and real time auditing. This is an excellent case for using blockchains to provide immutable evidence of delivery and quality.

All of these issues are covered in Climate Change House which is available from Amazon:

http://amzn.to/3RgR4Vf

Sprinkle a little joy all over the place

 In its 2019 manifesto, the Conservative Party pledged to spend £9.2 billion on upgrading the energy efficiency of homes, schools and hospitals. This included Social Housing.

Starting in 2022, tens of thousands of homes are to be built on derelict sites as part of a nearly £2 billion drive generously paid for by the British taxpayer through its agent, the Chancellor of the Exchequer. 

There is more:

• The Decarbonisation Fund Homes of £3.8 billion over a ten year period;

• Home Upgrade Grants worth £2.5 billion over a five year period and a Public Sector

• Decarbonisation Scheme of £2.9 billion over a five year period.

The government does not have a Climate Change policy but it does waste a tonne of my money on a wide range of sloppy handouts.There is a need for a single coherent approach.

Here are some of the green gestures the Tory party has lauded as Climate Change mitigation.

On the 8 July 2020, the Chancellor announced a £2 billion Green Homes Grant, with vouchers of up to £5,000 to help homeowners upgrade their homes, and up to £10,000 available to some of the UK’s poorest families.

There is also a £1 billion programme to make public buildings, including schools and hospitals, across the UK greener and £50 million to pilot innovative approaches to retrofitting social housing at scale.

The fourth round of the Contracts for Difference (CfD) scheme which aims to secure 12GW of electricity capacity opens with £285 million a year of funding for low carbon technology.

Then there is:

1. The Warm Home Discount gives £140 each year, mainly to pensioners and people who receive certain benefits. A small amount per house but a fortune overall.

2. The Winter Fuel Payment is a payment towards your winter heating if you're aged over 66 (you get more if you're over 80).

3. If winter is particularly cold, some households can get the £25 Cold Weather Payment for each week that it’s below zero degrees.

4. Fuel Direct can help you manage your energy bills if you get Income Support, income based Jobseeker’s Allowance, income related Employment and Support Allowance, Universal Credit or Pension Credit.

All of these projects carry with them an army of people trying to administer such schemes. So much for smaller government

Tomorrow I shall offer even more sprinkling taken from my book Climate Change House

House Prices Tumbling?

 There is now a lot of evidence that the buoyant housing market will not last, and house prices will reduce over the next five years. This is a conclusion in Climate House Change. It also notes that volatility also tends to drive away investors.

The prospect of future falling house prices is also politically a problem. Politicians tend not to be elected against house price instability scenarios. Taxing speculators is also a difficult option. There have to be alternatives to provide a known secure return in housing investment.

In addition, lower prices do not solve the need for accommodation; the demand for more homes will not fade even if the hyperinflation housing prices go away in the time it takes to build a housing estate.

The return we get from house price inflation is not good for the national economy. It is a case of higher prices but no productivity advantage. This need not be the case. Factory built houses cost less and are a productivity advance over bricks and mortar.

Instead of stoking inflation, it is possible to turn the investment in a house into a source of income. The idea that a house can generate energy, save water, reduce public sector costs such as social care, respiratory and allergy diseases and cut public service costs such as street cleaning, grass cutting and drone postal services is an eye opener. It grows the economy and cuts public sector costs.

And, by the by, it will be quite soon when climate change proofed houses are in much greater demand than other homes. And with inflation capped incentivise faster house improvements that make investing in renovation and re-building more attractive.

For the book:

The Financial Issues and Housing

 Today, The markets and mortgage rates are in turmoil.

It was not unexpected. I even commented on it in my book Climate Change House. Prescient or What!

There is considerable volatility that makes financing the housing sector problematic. However, the trend in inflation from houses has been with us for a long time supported by a perceived shortage of homes. One can only wonder at the bright green glee in the mind's eye as we behold the property money men.

There is every incentive for a wide range of powerful institutions to keep house price inflation growing. It is an asset that keeps investors from the smallest to the biggest, happy. This is an investment in inflation not in houses. It is not an investment in assets but even so does yield an income as people pay their mortgages.

There was some evidence that the buoyant housing market in 2021 would not last, and house prices may even reduce over the next five years. Volatility also tends to drive away investors.

The prospect of future falling house prices is also politically a problem. Politicians tend not to be elected against house price instability scenarios. Taxing speculators is also a difficult option. There has to be alternatives to provide a known secure return on housing investment.

In addition, lower prices do not solve the need for accommodation; the demand for more homes will not fade even if the hyperinflation housing prices go away in the time it takes to build a housing estate.

The return we get from house price inflation is not good for the national economy. It is a case of higher prices but no productivity advantage.

This need not be the case.

As I argue in the book, factory built houses cost less and have a productivity advance over bricks and mortar.

Instead of stoking inflation it is possible to turn the investment in a house into a source of income. The idea that a house can generate energy, save water, reduce public sector costs such as social care, respiratory and allergy diseases and cut public service costs such as street cleaning, grass cutting and drone postal services is an eye opener. It grows the economy and cuts public sector costs.

And, by the by, it will be quite soon when Climate Change proofed houses are in much greater demand than other homes.

Long after the impacts of the Ukraine war have passed, a big flood, fire, even a pandemic or social disruption caused by mass migration to avoid the effects of Climate Change with its consequential economic turmoil will have a knock on effect in the UK too.

By 2070, 19% of the world will be a barely livable hot zone. Just being outside for 4 hours will be a killer.

I thought it would be good to take a p\ragraph out of my book Climate Change House. It is quite pertinent after our longest drought, hottest days and the threat of unprecedented storms crossing the Atlantic.

It's not that we have not had them in the past, it's how much more severe they are as we get into more acute levels of Climate Change.

Homes are suffering increased problems due to Global Warming and the resultant frequency and severity of Climate Change.

Politically, people are leaning towards improved protection and mitigation of Climate Change and it's now a significant influence and belief in human-created climate change ranks third among the most critical issues for the population at large. YouGov opinion polls also show climate change as a key concern among electors and 80% of the adult population think of housing as an issue.

In five years, 570,000 new homes were built between 2016 and 2021. Mostly these new homes are not climate change resilient. Current policies throw a woolly insulation blanket over houses (new and old) and call it renovation, refurbishment or Global Warming mitigation and when the days pass with temperatures close to, or above, 40℃ it becomes apparent that the need for climate change mitigation which is a much bigger and life-threatening problem.

Occupants are at risk of overheating in their homes (there are still an estimated two thousand heat-related deaths per year and increasing). Household heating in winter is very likely to decrease due to warmer winters, and summer air conditioning demand will grow but there will be severe winter weather as well from time to time.

Time and Money Part 1

Money! It’s the hard thing to consider in Climate Change House.

One of the key players in this subject area is the Green Finance Institute. Its objectives are: “To achieve the transition to an inclusive, net zero carbon and climate resilient economy, both public and private finance is needed.”

In an interesting press release in November 2021 it announced a new initiative:

“The need to unlock finance to retrofit homes in the owner occupier sector is now clearly recognised, and the range of products available is beginning to grow, with pioneering financial institutions launching and continually developing new ways of lending for energy efficiency upgrades.”

The idea of such an organisation is worthy. However, most of its thinking is focused on mitigating global warming and not Climate Change.

It is an example of the confused thinking among those that have come to global warming and its impacts late.

There are other such worthy organisations. ESG – short for Environmental, Social and Governance – is a set of standards measuring a business's impact on society, the environment, and how transparent and accountable it is.

According to the CBI, two-thirds of investors take ESG factors into account when investing in a company meaning ESG has the potential to grow a business while benefiting the environment and community.

Green mortgages a long way to go - Olga Lioncat

More than 10 mortgage lenders in the UK have launched green mortgage products since the beginning of 2021 alone, but this is a relatively small proportion of the UK’s £1.58 trillion mortgage market. According to the Intermediary Mortgage Lenders Association, 77% of lenders are planning to launch green mortgages that are cheaper or priced the same as a typical product. Acting as a central knowledge hub, the Green Finance Institute has launched the Green Mortgage Hub, an online resource collating publicly available information on UK green mortgages into an interactive table, alongside a library of articles, reports, tools and experiments related to the green mortgage market. The hub aims to inform and encourage lenders considering entry into the green mortgage market. It aims to be a trusted source of information for mortgage intermediaries, policymakers and NGOs focused on decarbonising the built environment (that is global warming mitigation but not necessarily Climate Change) management.

The Green Mortgage Hub has a list of lenders offering a range of services. However, there is the other side of the coin. The current forms of finance are a form of tax and it is difficult for a large proportion of the population.

In the book, I offer a number of other solutions and I will be exercising them here in due course.

Housing Planning - OOPs

Perhaps it’s now time to examine the institutions involved in developing our homes. These are not ‘homes of the future’. They are homes now for the future.

There is a lot of confusion around. It is important to examine the initiatives of the most influential organisations.

Key among the Chartered institutions affecting housing and Climate Change is the Royal Town Planning Institute (RTPI). The work of its members is heavily criticised as its members produce a conveyor belt of inappropriate planning decisions. Planning outcomes are reputation-crushing. The carbuncle housing estates attached to practically all villages are a classic case in point.

They are cast in a mould of £350,000 new houses supported by an infrastructure that sheds estate-wide rainwater into concrete culverts rushing towards the next flood pinch-point.

The RTPI website says “Planners can embed climate action in local decision making, faster net zero transport, improve urban greening, create affordable housing, smart cities and protect infrastructure from flooding.” The word ‘can’ is a real giveaway. As France, Spain and the UK enjoy weather over 40C it would seem the threat of such temperatures is not a big issue for planners. 

There is a greater urgency needed. 

Victoria Hills, Chief Executive of the RTPI, said: “Planners are a driving force in addressing the climate crisis….” Good. We look forward to it.

But there is not a solar panel in sight in new Bloor Houses (see left).

The Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) is another example. It has set itself a professional challenge.

The ‘2030 Climate Challenge’ is a voluntary initiative for RIBA Chartered Practitioners to join and demonstrate their commitment to attempting to meet key sustainability targets on the buildings they design. 

It includes targets for annual energy use, embodied carbon over the building's lifecycle and annual water use. It provides a stepped approach towards reaching net zero. They are not quite sure if this means net-zero emissions to ameliorate global warming or do these ambitions also reflect the dangers of Climate Change?

The challenge is not mandatory, it is a commitment to show leadership among members’ projects and attempt to meet the targets.

The first reaction to such an ambition is to identify that it focuses on mitigating global warming rather than Climate Change alleviation. It is probably unfair to single out RIBA as an exemplar and there are many other similar organisations in the same sort of fix but RIBA is a relevant example.