For housebuilders - like any consumer-facing industry - the key to profitability has always been building homes that consumers wanted to buy: the right product in the right place for the right price.
In recent years however, the goal posts have moved significantly and development now has to respond to a new imperative: climate change. The Government is committed to reducing the UK’s carbon emissions by 80% by the year 2050. Meeting that target will require a fundamental re-evaluation of the way new homes are designed and built.
There has been scepticism that environmentally-friendly building is not compatible with profit-led, consumer-focused development. At VELUX, however, we are convinced that these interests can be reconciled and we are undertaking a unique experiment to prove that we are right.
The VELUX Model Home 2020 project will see the construction of six highly sustainable demonstration buildings in different countries across Europe. The houses will all reflect and respond to three main principles - efficient energy design, a high liveability factor and minimum climate impact.
In the UK, VELUX will build two low carbon homes in the centre of Bovis Homes’ Charter Park development in Rothwell, Kettering. Construction is expected to begin in May 2010. We believe that the homes are the first designed to the official definition of zero carbon (Level 6 of the Code for Sustainable Homes) under the new carbon compliance levels. They are intended to deliver a 70% reduction in carbon emissions through improved design and energy efficiency with the remaining 30% of carbon to be offset by allowable solutions; for example by funding improvements of existing local housing stock.
However, the project is not just about building environmentally-friendly homes. We are equally determined that the Model Home 2020 properties should be appealing and affordable for consumers as well as being profitable and easily replicable for the mass housebuilding market. This ambition sets the project apart from previous experiments by other firms, which, almost without exception, have focused on the building performance rather than the impact of the performance on the users, with little consideration for remaining reasonably priced.
The homes’ open-plan layout and floor-to-ceiling windows will maximise light, making them attractive and healthy places to live. They will be built to the principle of Active Living, which means that they will compliment the lifestyles of their occupants, reconnecting modern life with the rhythms and patterns of nature; encouraging families to spend more time at home, working, caring for the allotment, entertaining, or just relaxing.
The scheme benefits from class leading U Values and levels of air tightness. Each home will be super insulated and heated by air source heat pumps with individual biomass stoves as a source of secondary heat during the winter. The properties will also incorporate renewable technologies such as the VELUX solar hot water system, which will reduce the homeowners’ energy bills and overall carbon emissions from heating and hot water.
With this design, we believe that we will achieve our ambition to build the first zero carbon homes that people can afford to buy and will want to live in. In fact, rather than being confined to an innovation park, the project is being built on a real commercial development precisely because the homes will be occupied by real families on completion. VELUX will then be able to monitor all aspects of the Model Homes, including the interaction between builder and its occupants, as opposed to focusing narrowly on the properties’ environmental performance.
We are working with a number of key partners including HTA Architects, which has extensive experience in the regeneration and sustainability sector; Willmott Dixon; Kettering Borough Council, and North Northants Development Company (NNDC), to ensure the successful delivery of the project. By working together, we hope the ModelHome 2020 project will shape the agenda around zero-carbon construction.
