UK Builders Gear Up For Zero Carbon Housing
by Lloyd Alter, Toronto on 01.15.07
While builders in North America keep cranking out the subdivisions and barely tinker with building codes, in the UK all home have to be zero-carbon by 2016 and the builders are holding summits with the Government to figure out how. (A zero-carbon house is defined as one which produces as much energy, by using solar panels or wind turbines, as it consumes.) Instead of whinging doing business as usual, they are saying things like "These houses will produce less than half the carbon emissions of a traditionally built house, they will cost about a third as much to run, and we're building them at the same cost as a standard house type in this country" Even environmental groups like Greenpeace welcomed this summit, saying "Tackling emissions from homes is really important and zero-carbon homes are therefore crucial." Zero carbon houses are being built across the UK with environmentally-friendly developments in Brixton, south London, and Leicester, in the East Midlands. How many are being built in North America? ::Guardian
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Talking of housing, why not get a job with Tesco so you can stay in one of their new 'prison camps' they are building for employees, making it easier for them to hire you, so you can sell their products AKA chip away at stones for them AKA slave labour ... and pay them for the pleasure.
The stone you are chipping away at is actually the earth and Tesco are one of its arch enemies. They are leading the 'race to the bottom'.
No doubt they will follow M&S in the next few days with some eco announcement. Show your loyalty to the earth, not to Tesco.
This is good news, but I wouldn't be too quick to praise these home builders. If the government hadn't mandated zero carbon homes, these companies would never have taken the initiative by themselves. In fact, I don't know of any initiative these home building companies have ever taken by themselves to improve the quality of housing. Every improvement has been through government legislation or government initiated schemes.
You only have to look at home building companies in Germany to realise how far behind Britain is when it comes to buidling quality modern homes.
I would be very interested in hearing the specifics about Britain's legislation mandating zero carbon homes. I had heard that there were proposals but not that legislation had been passed.
Yes, that's right. Legislation hasn't been passed, the proposals are part of a consultation paper.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/6176229.stm
There's a link to a PDF copy of the consultation paper at the bottom of this page:
http://www.communities.gov.uk/index.asp?id=1505157