The future of heating: meeting the challenge

Posted on: 27 March 2013
By: mackene
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The Government has published its Heat Strategy and provided an update on the Renewable Heat Incentive (RHI) for homes. The Strategy looks at the potential to cut emissions from heat across the whole UK economy and focuses on key actions to drive the move to low carbon heating alternatives.

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Ecobuild. London, 5-7 March 2013

Posted on: 26 March 2013
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Ecobuild is described as the world’s biggest event for sustainable design, construction and the built environment. Conference presentations are available under the following headings: Making sustsinable construction happen; Beyond construction; Design, architecture and sustainability; Sustainable property; Sustainability overseas. Seminar presentations are also available under the following headings: Sustainable self-build and renovation; Buildings in use; Water, waste and materials; Delivering sustainability in the city; Passivhaus; Whole life carbon and other impacts; Refurbishing Britain; Property; Sustainable by design; Rules and Regulations; Green energy; and BIM. You need to register on the site to view the presentations.

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Exploratory research into Building Regulations in relation to the Green Deal

Posted on: 25 March 2013
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This publication from the Energy Saving Trust contains exploratory research into building regulations in relation to the Green Deal.

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European nearly-zero energy buildings

Posted on: 21 March 2013
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The British Social Housing Foundation is involved in a three- year project which is currently being funded by the EU’s Intelligent Energy Programme. This is entitled the nearly-Zero Energy Challenge and will build capacity and confidence amongst Europe’s social, cooperative and public housing providers ahead of the nearly-Zero Energy Buildings (nZEB) obligations to be introduced in 2020, which will require that all new buildings should be nearly-Zero in terms of their energy consumption, with any energy required sourced from renewable supplies. In partnership with CECODHAS Housing Europe, BSHF has recently published a progress report on the “Fair Energy Transition towards nearly-Zero Energy Buildings”.  Social, cooperative and public housing providers in Europe currently own and manage over 27 million homes (12 per cent of the total housing stock), many of which needs significant improvement to increase its energy efficiency.  The progress report presents the current developments towards nZEB in Europe, as well as the barriers faced. The report also provides recommendations for action that could be implemented to ease the transition to nearly-zero energy homes, with a variety of best policy and practice examples emerging throughout Europe that are dealing with different aspects of delivering a fair energy transition. The report was presented at the World Sustainable Energy Days conference in Wels, Austria on 1st March 2013. This report is available here  and a copy of the presentation made at this event can be viewed online.

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A UK ‘dash’ for smart gas

Posted on: 19 March 2013
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Unconventional gas sources such as shale gas could have a role to play in helping to decarbonise the UK energy sector, according to a new report published by the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment. The report suggests that natural gas, including from unconventional sources, has an important role to play in the transition to low-carbon electricity generation. Replacing coal power stations with gas over the short term would help to reduce UK carbon emissions, as gas emits less than half the carbon dioxide per kilowatt-hour of coal. However in the long term emissions from gas-fired power stations would prevent us from meeting the UK’s carbon targets, “unless it is accompanied by the widespread introduction of carbon capture and storage technology”.

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Distribution of carbon emissions in the UK: Implications for domestic energy policy

Posted on: 14 March 2013
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The Joseph Rowntree Foundation has published a report which examines how carbon emissions are distributed across households in Great Britain and the implications for energy and climate change policy. This project uses advanced modelling techniques to look at: the distribution of carbon emissions, from energy consumed in the home and through personal travel by car, public transport and aviation, across households in Great Britain; the impact of existing Government energy and climate policies on consumer energy bills and household emissions in England; and the potential for an alternative approach to reducing emissions in the domestic sector through a wide-scale retrofit of the housing stock.

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The role of ICT for energy efficient buildings: A contribution to Horizon 2020. Brussels, 28 February 2013

Posted on: 14 March 2013
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ICT4E2B Forum partners presented their project’s final results about the role of ICT for Energy efficient buildings to an audience of over 120 attendees. The project funded by DG CONNECT and developed within the framework of the Energy-efficient Buildings Public Private Partnership (EeB PPP) initiative, has performed a deep analysis of the research challenges and innovation priorities that ICT will have to address in future. These recommendations have been duly taken into account in the new Roadmap developed by E2BA towards a possible continuation of the EeB PPP within Horizon 2020. Presentations and background reports and information are available online.

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Building Sustainability Sweden 2012. Stockholm, 18-19 October 2012

Posted on: 13 March 2013
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At this event Swedish and international experts provided up-to-date knowledge on new materials, technology and energy-efficient solutions. Presentations are available from plenary and workshop sessions, covering such issues as retrofitting; climate change impact in urban areas; mobility in the future city; sustainable living in cities; and energy saving in residential and commercial buildings.

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Sustainable Future Energy 2012. Bandar Seri Begawan, Brunei Darussalam, 21-23 November 2012

Posted on: 13 March 2013
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This event brought together the energy research community to share recent advances in various areas of energy research and solutions. Proceedings are available online.

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CASH Final Conference. Brussels, 27-29 November 2012

Posted on: 13 March 2013
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In the new context of the EU Cohesion Policy 2014-2020, State members are asked to heavily invest in Energy Efficiency (EE) and Social issues. Member States with Managing Authorities are programming the use of these new structural funds. However, there are important barriers to energy efficiency implementation in social housing. The objective of the final CASH Conference was to share with managing authorities, the European Commission, in particular Directorate-General Regional and Urban policy and Directorate-General Energy, EU Parliament members and European organisations, the recommendations of the network to reduce these barriers and to come out with key programming criteria to make the best use of new structural funds for Energy Efficient renovation of social housing with a systemic approach and a mass perspective. Presentations and criteria from the Round Table are available online.

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