The crucial role of data in decarbonising our buildings

Lisa Cairns, from IRT Surveys, discusses how data and technology can help housing providers make smarter retrofit decisions in an article on the Housing Digital_ website.

 

Decarbonisation: The value of using data and technology

While the new Labour government’s commitment to improving energy efficiency in UK homes is warmly welcomed, retrofitting the existing property stock, including the four million homes within the social housing sector, remains a significant challenge if the country’s net zero targets are to be met.

The government’s Warmer Homes Plan, which aims to upgrade over 5m homes over the next parliament, will see Westminster invest £6.6bn in grants and low-interest loans, as well as encouraging private finance initiatives, to ensure homes in the social and private rented sector meet minimum energy efficiency standards by 2030.

While this will see a doubling of investment from the last government, the estimated retrofit costs required to achieve net zero in the housing sector by 2050, is £104bn.

While more money is likely to be available for retrofitting projects, one of the biggest challenges for the social housing sector is ensuring that spending decisions have the maximum impact on improving energy efficiency.

The most effective solution in terms of cost-effectiveness and long-term energy savings is to address issues with individual homes, such as missing insulation, porous brickwork, render delamination and waterproofing problems. This ensures that budgets are targeted to fix identified problems rather than being wasted on unnecessary upgrades.

Another major challenge for the sector is that if the government is to meet its Warmer Homes Plan objectives, and make significant progress toward the 2050 net zero target, then retrofitting projects will need to take place at pace and scale.

The crucial role of data

Accurate data will play an important role in enabling housing providers to understand the most effective path to decarbonisation and how to achieve this at scale.

Delivering detailed information and valuable insights about individual properties, data improves project-wide decision-making while enabling tailored solutions to be implemented that benefit not just providers and their tenants, but the environment too.

Thermal imaging is a prime example of how modern technology can be used to gather data to assess housing stock. Offering a fabric-first approach to understanding a property’s thermal performance, it gives social housing providers an accurate visual insight into the condition of the property’s fabric and its energy deficiencies.

Not only does this produce a set of measures that enable data-driven decision-making; but it also informs providers about specific energy efficiency issues that other forms of survey often fail to detect, such as draughts, empty or half-filled wall cavities, porous brickwork, defective insulation, waterproofing and rendering issues, and more.

Another advantage of thermal imaging is that, unlike traditional survey methods, it is neither invasive nor destructive. Scaffolding is not required; properties are not damaged, and repairs don’t need to be made. A comprehensive, single survey process that can be carried out relatively quickly, it is a cost-effective and convenient solution that allows issues to be identified and addressed sooner.

Other new technologies can also assist housing providers in making smarter retrofit decisions. MappIR, for example, is a unique vehicle that brings together visual and thermal imaging and LiDAR technology to deliver invaluable energy efficiency data about larger areas.

Conducting surveys at speed and low cost, it can map entire streets, housing estates and even cities, providing detailed information about the energy efficiency of the properties it has scanned. This includes identifying heat loss and insulation defects, assessing the condition of building fabric and detecting water ingress, damp and ‘at-risk’ properties.

As an at-scale survey tool, MappIR has proved to be a highly effective solution for councils considering the creation of ‘area-based’ schemes and ‘place-based’ projects, having successfully surveyed over 10,000 social homes in Milton Keynes.

Advanced technology’s role extends beyond surveying. Specialised retrofitting software, such as DREam, has now been developed, that analyses surveying and other project data to identify the specific upgrades each home needs to improve its energy efficiency.

Housing providers that use this innovative software are not only given a clear understanding of the energy efficiency measures each property needs, but they can accurately calculate the cost of the proposed improvements, and ensure their projects match available finances.

Moreover, the software can also track improvements and progress towards decarbonisation targets throughout a retrofit project, delivering optimum outcomes for residents and the environment, while ensuring the project remains cost-effective.

An example of this technology in use was seen in a recent project in the South of England. Here, 200 homes of differing construction types were thermally surveyed, and the images were analysed to assess heat loss, defects and the condition of insulation.

Filtering and mapping tools were then applied to the data to evaluate a range of retrofit approaches, enabling the homes to be grouped and prioritised for upgrade. Relevant funding for the project was then found and applied for.

The value of working with expert partners

Substantial work needs to take place quickly if the UK’s existing housing stock is to meet current performance standards before the 2050 net zero deadline. To achieve this, social housing providers will need to implement costly, at-scale retrofit projects that are complex to plan and difficult to manage.

By partnering with an experienced company, with a successful track record of delivering projects for major organisations, they can benefit from valuable expertise while being assured of a complete solution.

Beyond receiving thermal images, they can be confident of a fast efficient suite of services, using innovative technologies, tried and tested software also hardware, which provide a detailed understanding of their entire housing stock’s retrofitting requirements.

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