Housing co-operative launches zero-carbon housing programme

Friday, Apr 10, 2009

Tenants First Housing Co-operative, Britain’s largest housing co-operative, is launching a quest to develop high-quality, carbon-neutral housing.

The three-year programme will be run as a Knowledge Transfer Partnership between Tenants First and the Mackintosh School of Architecture in Glasgow and will employ an architect working full-time at Tenants First. 

The aim is to develop a house construction system that will meet the highest-level in the Government’s code for sustainable homes. The code sets a national standard for houses and uses a rating system from one to six. 

The Tenants First programme is aimed at a six-star rating, indicating the lowest levels of carbon emissions and the highest standard of sustainability. 

Commenting on the initiative Euan Barr, Project Manager with Tenants First, said:

“Tenants First has a record of innovation in construction techniques aimed at improving the efficiency and quality of the homes we build for our members. Most notable are our award-winning projects at Ballater where we utilised a Dutch construction system never seen in this country before, and Peterhead where we piloted offsite timber frame technology.

“With this new initiative we are aiming to develop a construction system that will deliver real benefits for the environment, while providing our members with high-quality homes that have very low running costs.

“One of the challenges we will face is that the technologies to reduce carbon emissions can be costly. As an organisation dedicated to providing affordable homes, we need to find a way of achieving six-star standards of sustainability, without the high cost.” 

For the Mackintosh School of Architecture, the project will be led by Dr Masa Noguchi. Dr Noguchi is a specialist in environmental building design, materials and methods applied to sustainable architecture. Dr Noguchi has international experience in delivering low carbon mass custom homes. 

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