Tag: fabric first approach

HPH196 : Why communication is central to self build success – with Lucy Pedler
Lucy Pedler, architect and founder of The Green Register, talks about the importance of good communication throughout a self-build project.

Interview with Lucy Pedler

As a child, Lucy was interested in the worlds of science and arts and wanted a profession that could combine the two. She qualified 35 years ago, and has worked as an architect in the UK and US.

Influenced by her father, an environmentalist, Lucy wanted her career to encompass both architectural and environmental work. In the early ‘90s, she worked as a Product Specialist at Construction Resources (the UK’s first Ecological Building Centre) for five years; this involved researching the environmental impact of building materials and systems, and training other construction professionals in green building.

In 2000, Lucy launched The Green Register, a not-for-profit organisation providing independent training and promoting sustainable building practices across the construction industry.

Poor communication is the cause of many problems

Lucy believes we spend quite a lot of time as human beings not saying what we think! If you can communicate effectively – using a bit of tact and choosing words carefully – people know where they stand. Lucy says some people think she’s quite direct but at least there’s no grey area.

Making the importance of communication clear from the start helps to create an environment where everybody’s comfortable talking about the build.

A robust brief ensures everyone’s on the same page

Good communication is key to making the project a success and this begins with a detailed brief. To produce one, the architect or designer must first thoroughly understand what the client wants.

This document should then be referred to throughout the build process as things inevitably change. For example, there may be planning issues, unexpected problems on site, or design alterations. A detailed brief aids important discussions about the time, cost and design implications of changes.

It’s worth spending time setting the green agenda

When people tell Lucy they want a ‘low energy house’ she needs to clarify exactly what that means. Clients may just want low energy bills, or they may have concerns about the bigger picture: the way the house is built, materials used, internal environment, wellbeing, etc. It’s a lot of work that has to be done at the beginning, but Lucy says you’ll reap the benefits throughout the process.

Be realistic about the budget from the outset

A fabric first approach is much better in terms of environmental issues and impact. But Lucy understands that the majority of people don’t have the money to do 100% sustainable buildings, commenting, “Don’t beat yourself up if you haven’t got the perfect house because whatever you do is going to be better than the average house in the UK, which is very, very mediocre.”

Lucy advises people to be honest about access to funds and what you have upfront. Then everybody involved knows what you can afford. You don’t want to run out of money and work to suddenly stop onsite.

The project lead should manage expectations about cost

During a career spanning more than 30 years, Lucy can’t remember a project where the cost didn’t change, usually in an upward direction. Managing clients’ expectations won’t make the problem go away, but lessens their disappointment.

The architect (or lead) should explain the process and set expectations that the project will probably go over cost and time. If unexpected costs arise, they’ll refer back to the brief so the client can decide whether to increase the budget or save costs elsewhere. Lucy says self-builders often see the long-term benefits of increasing the budget.

There’s huge value in face-to-face communication

Modern communication technology sets expectations that everything can be done immediately. While some decisions are quick to make, Lucy thinks we’ve lost something in not being given the time to consider things.

Projects can be discussed remotely using phone, Skype and email, but Lucy gives reasons why talking to clients in person can be advantageous:
- You can sketch over plans while talking through concepts.
- It’s easier to compare room sizes on plans with the room you’re all sitting in.
- Some decisions take a bit of time and are best explained face-to-face.
- You can observe non-verbal reactions, e.g. facial expressions.
3D modelling makes it easier to convey concepts

Many clients can’t understand 2D drawings and Lucy comments, “Why should they? It took us seven years of training to get where we are.” She recommends a programme called SketchUp, which is very simple and can quickly produce a 3D walkthrough to use with clients, helping them to experience light and height and changes in space, etc.

It’s important that concepts aren’t presented as a fait accompli, and Lucy says clients should feel able to give feedback. Reviewing conceptual designs is a key stage for communication, when you’ll work out basics such as the position of the living room or the size of the kitchen.

Design iterations take time and can be costly

Lucy recalls a client who requested ten different designs for a 2m x 2m bathroom and chose the original one in the end! A helpful approach is for the architect or designer to state upfront the number of design options included in their price, and make it clear they’ll have to start charging extra for any additional major changes.

A collaborative design and build approach is worth considering

While in the States, Lucy worked with contractors from the conceptual stage onwards and the contractor would inform some of the technical decisions. This approach required a high level of trust, but meant shared ownership of the project. And when it came to pricing the job, the cost was quite realistic.

Lucy says when you go out to competitive tender, contractors may not have understood the drawings or might not be pricing accurately. She cautions, “Although it might appear initially to be the lowest cost, at the end they’re clawing back what they need in order to make a profit.”

A neutral third person can mediate between client and contractor

Lucy says if clients can afford to appoint someone to oversee the project that’s a real plus. The architect or project manager can tell them early on what’s likely to happen during the construction stage and clarify what their fee will cover.

Self-builders often get much more involved, but Lucy suggests clients don’t take on the project management role themselves as they’re too close to the project and usually don’t have the experience needed.

Agree a schedule of meetings for the build

When the construction stage begins, you’re introducing a lot more people, so communication can be challenging. And clients often perceive progress to be slow and see costs increase and timescales slip during this stage.

It’s helpful to plan a schedule of meetings and clarify to the whole project team where they’ll be held, who does/doesn’t need to attend, what’s going to be covered, etc.

Lucy says the one group of people they find very difficult to get into Green Register seminars are builders. She recommends ‘toolbox talks’ if you’re trying to achieve a low energy building, as spending just a few hours explaining the concepts is money well spent.

3 more tips for a successful self-build
1. The amount of information and decision-making can be overwhelming. Decide how involved you want to be, e.g. technical decisions may be best left to professionals trained to deal with them.
2. It’s important no one in the team holds back. The client, architect or contractor needs to share their concerns or say if there’s something they have doubts about.
3. The Green Register encourages post-occupancy monitoring (e.g. of airtightness, fuel costs, etc.). This can reassure you that you’ve got what you set out to achieve.
Find out more

Visit the website of The Green Register

Follow The Green Register on Twitter

Transcript

Download a transcript of the interview with Lucy Pedler

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November 27, 2017
HPH026 : Achieving Airtightness in Low Energy Buildings – with Paul Jennings from Aldas
Paul Jennings from Aldas explains why airtightness is an important factor to grasp when constructing an energy efficient home. He also shares how forward planning, attention to detail and teamwork are imperative for achieving good airtightness results.

Interview with Paul Jennings

After doing an engineering design degree in the 1980s, Paul worked for an energy charity in London. This charity acquired some air testing equipment because fuel poverty was becoming more of an issue and Paul began testing various council flats and houses for airtightness, with a view to improving the stock.

Historically There Have Been Some Very Airtight Buildings

Paul says that one of the most airtight structures he’s tested was part of Gloucester Cathedral. Despite being 600 years old, due to the nature of the construction with lime plaster over stone, it is pretty airtight. Conversely some modern housing – built by developers in the seventies, eighties and nineties – is not very airtight.

Poorly-Built Modern Housing Will Need to Be Demolished

Paul believes that it’s much easier to improve the airtightness of a property from the Victorian and Edwardian era than it is to fix poorly-built modern housing. He says that there’s too much to do and that we’ll end up just knocking them down and starting again.

There Are Two Primary Measures of Airtightness

1. Air permeability is the amount of air which flows through the fabric – the walls, the roof and the floor – of a building per hour at a particular pressure. This pressure is usually 50 pascals (50 Pa), which is equivalent to 5 millimetres of water gauge pressure. This is not a huge pressure and Paul puts it into perspective by saying that you would apply 2000 Pa with your mouth when you drink a milkshake through a straw. Yet it doesn’t hurt you. That is air permeability and it’s part of the (UK) building regulations for new builds.

2. Air changes per hour is a volumetric measure of how much air passes into or out of a building per hour at a given pressure (which is also usually 50 Pa). This is most appropriate for conditioned buildings that have heat recovery ventilation, where the warmed or cooled air passes through the ventilation system rather than leaking out around doors, windows, through cracks, etc. So the measure of air changes per hour is what is used for more airtight buildings, such as buildings that meet the Passivhaus standard.

The stringent airtightness target of a Passivhaus is 0.6 air changes per hour whereas UK building regulations require a maximum air permeability of 10. Therefore achieving the Passivhaus criteria is about 16 times more onerous. Also, the closer you get to the lower yield for which you are aiming, the harder it is. Getting airtightness down from 10 to 5 is easy, but getting it from 1 to 0.6 is generally very hard. Obviously this varies according to building design, building type, but above all it varies according to the quality of the builder. Paul stresses that the biggest issue we face with delivering airtightness is how we make our builders do what they need to do and work to these sufficiently high standards.

Good Design is Integral to Achieving an Airtight Building

The first part of the process is to look at the design of the building because there are things that can be done to make it easier to achieve airtightness. For example, in Germany it is common to build upper floors with concrete rather than suspended timber. This is because where there’s suspended timber there are voids which air can pass through. Paul talks about doing tests on three storey town houses where the room thermostat on the internal wall of the mid-floor living room is leaking air. That’s because when you’re testing it, air is coming up through it because it’s connecting through the voids in the walls and floors. Having solid upper floors would make a significant difference.

Also, warm roof construction (where the insulation follows the line of the roof) would be beneficial for airtightness. Paul says: “A cold roof often has a tricky detail at the eaves where you have to try and maintain airtightness but you also want ventilation into a cold loft space, so trying to have those two things in what is becoming a tight space in that angle in the eaves, often becomes difficult for people and one of the places it goes wrong.”

Most Building Materials Are Pretty Airtight

A lot of materials (including glass, plasterboard and solid timber) are pretty airtight. Blockwork, however, can vary a lot. Paul’s seen walls that he can blow through!

“One of the things we say for new build [is] if you have blockwork coming off an external wall into the dwelling you have to make sure it is airtight for at least a metre into the dwelling. So you basically have to plaster, if you are doing a wet plaster system, on the return internal partition walls as well as on the inside of the external wall. Even then we’ve had cases where they are using recycled power station ash, fuel ash, in the blockwork, they can be very very porous and a metre is not enough. We’ve had air running through internal dividing walls by up to four metres, which goes beyond what you are expecting, it goes outside the design and then becomes a problem. So often with this it’s where you have variations, where people move a duct, people change a window size, people discover that blockwork is leaking where it is not, it goes wrong. If you are smart for airtightness you have a programme, because it doesn’t happen by accident.”

There Should be a Minimum Airtightness Standard of 3

The minimum airtightness standard that Paul tends to work to is 3 air changes per hour, which is the AECB Silver Standard, obviously going down to 0.6 for Passivhaus.

Delivering Airtightness is All About Planning

Specifying just the target or even the materials is not enough, it’s about the process. Air barrier drawings must be created, showing in a red line what the airtightness is, where it is, with notes specifying the material, the package of works and who is doing it. Then there is the process of going through and checking, which is called a design review, making sure that it all joins up.

Mistakes During Construction Need to be Dealt with, Rather than Hidden

Paul says that everyone makes mistakes but that part of the problem with the [UK] construction industry is mistakes are hidden. On many occasions he’s seen something that’s been put in the wrong place, like a hole for a boiler flue, a hole for a heat recovery duct or an extract fan. Instead of owning up to this, acknowledging it and dealing with it in the appropriate way it gets hidden. This can have ramifications for many years to come.

As Soon as You Have Voids, Air Can Go Anywhere

As soon as you have voids, such as a cavity wall, the air can go anywhere. Even if you can’t see a hole on the outside of the building, if there is a hole in the inner leaf connecting to the cavity that’s as good as to outside. This is also applicable with old buildings. For example, you may think you have a solid stone wall of half a metre in a church, but actually it’s stone on either side with a rubble-filled cavity. A lot of air will pass through those walls. As soon as it’s lime plastered on the inside, the problem goes. People do not expect buildings to leak where they do leak.

Buildings Can be Tested for Airtightness with a Blower Door

In order to carry out this test a calibrated small, big or very large trailer fan is mounted in an open doorway or window. There are various adjustable door systems, too. Paul describes how it has varying ranges of how much air it will blow, from small to very large. Normally the process begins with sucking air out of the building. This is called depressurisation. With the building at a lower pressure the atmospheric pressure forces air back through the cracks, the gaps, the leaky dampers, the windows that the draught seals are not quite right, etc. Above 25 Pa a strong draught is created, which is maintained for the duration of the test and then the locations of these draughts can be established.

During Testing There are Numerous Ways to Detect Draughts

Often you can feel draughts with your hand. If you put your eyeball next to a draught it may be even easier to perceive because your eyes are even more sensitive. There are also different sorts of chemical smoke and stage smoke that can be used. Acoustic testing is another option. You can also put anemometers next to where you think the whole is.

Infrared cameras can help find leaks because, especially in the very airtight buildings, it can be the coldness where the air’s leaked that shows you where the leak is rather than feeling the leak itself. After ten minutes of cold air it starts to show up on a thermographic camera.

Builders Often Turn Air Tests into Leak Location Exercises

Under (UK) building regulations, construction testing is required for houses, albeit sample testing. However, Paul says: “One of the current issues is that the building regulations say if you do a test and it fails you not only have to fix it and retest it you have to test another one of the same type as well – the sample size goes up. Yet there have been no failures or almost no failures reported, and why is that? Well we know why that is because any builder, sensible builder, says actually let’s make this a leak location exercise not a test and we’ll fix it and then you can test it again, which is legal but is definitely against the spirit and we definitely, I think as a nation, are building in problems for the future with poorly performing houses where we have small sample sizes on large volumes, large numbers of houses and especially where they are timber frame.”

Research is Needed to Discover How Long Airtight Barriers will Last

While the suppliers of materials, especially the better airtightness materials, do accelerated ageing on their products claiming they will perhaps last for 50 years, they are not in a 50 year old building. So nobody really knows how long airtightness barriers can remain and that’s why more research and monitoring is necessary. Most things are fairly stable, but it’s the joints, the interfaces and the penetrations that move. Very high quality mastics have a bit of give and allow the building to move, to shrink, to thermally change over time. At the other end of the scale, where builders have used very cheap caulk, cracks can begin to form within weeks of it being applied.

Vapour Open Materials Allow Moisture Through Without Letting Air Through

Vapour open materials will allow moisture through without letting air through. Moisture will wick through materials so will soak into a service, pass through the material and come out the other side. That doesn’t require a hole that will let air through – the building is vapour permeable. In the past they used to be called breathable but that’s a misnomer because it’s not. Recently they have created what they call ‘intelligent materials’ which vary according to temperature and pressure in which direction they allow moisture to move, but again they are airtight and nobody should be under the illusion that if they want a vapour permeable building they have to make it airtight.

Extremes in Ventilation Often Occur in Traditionally-Built Buildings

Paul says at the moment most UK houses have too much ventilation when the wind blows and not enough ventilation if the wind doesn’t blow. That means we have the worst of both worlds. However, as we move to more airtight constructions or very airtight with Passivhaus, there must be ventilation. People worry about this but we don’t need very much movement of air to give us the oxygen we need to breath. It is reckoned to be about thirty litres per second per person for moisture control and for breathing, depending on exercise levels, two three or four. It’s an order of magnitude difference. Paul jokes: “You will be getting black mould growing out of your ears before you suffocate in an airtight house!”

Indoor Air Quality is Another Part of Airtightness

When considering airtightness it’s important to remember there is less dilution of pollutants happening and that means avoiding paints that are going to give off volatile organics, for example. So, be careful about specification of paints, furniture and things like new computers that give off lots of toxic materials. All of these things become more of an issue in an airtight house, but of course the big one is moisture.

Choose Contractors with a Good Track Record of Achieving Airtightness

Paul recommends that when looking for contractors, you should find out what they’ve done elsewhere and what air results they have achieved. If you hire a bog standard builder without any knowledge of airtightness to carry out the work, then be aware that you will be paying for their learning curve. It does depend of the level of airtightness you are trying to achieve.

We Need to be Delivering Better Quality Airtightness, Particularly in Refurbishment

Paul reckons that when it comes to new build projects potentially we are not bad in terms of airtightness. In refurbishment he says we’ve [UK] got to learn a lot. The focus should be on improving the skills base and doing much more testing of refurbishment projects so that people understand the issues and can see the difference before and after. This is not only for energy efficiency but if we want buildings to last. Sustainable construction means construction that is not rotting from interstitial condensation 5,10 or 15 years down the line.

Take a Fabric First and Avoid the Eco Bling

While there is a place for solar panels and the like, our priority should be in getting the building fabric right first. Paul believes a lot of the construction industry should be taken to task for the poor quality they deliver in refurbishment.

Transcript

Download a transcript of the interview with Paul Jennings.

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July 3, 2013
HPH017 : Can a Ground Source Heat Pump Make an Old House Energy Efficient? – with Justin Broadbent from isoenergy
Justin Broadbent from isoenergy explains what a ground source heat pump is and how it could be used as a solution to make a period property energy efficient.

Interview with Justin Broadbent

Justin founded isoenergy 14 years ago after he sold his software company. An engineer by trade, Justin was keen to reduce the running costs of his period home and also get rid of his dependency on oil. As his father-in-law was a part owner in a Swedish manufacturer of heating systems, he began to discover more about Sweden’s approach to low energy buildings with very high levels of insulation and soon realised that the UK had a lot to learn about energy efficiency.

Before Plugging in Something Mechanical, Reduce Your Heat Losses

Justin started out as a consultant and as things grew he begun to import the machinery, too. This soon led to doing the installations as well. Even though isoenergy designs and installs renewable energy systems, a fabric first approach is always the starting point. The most expensive heat that you put into your house is the heat you’re putting in the second, third or fourth time, and so on, because you’ve lost it the first time.

A Heat Pump Compresses Energy

Justin explains how a heat pump works, using a bicycle pump as an example. As you inflate the tyre you may notice the end of the pump starts to get warm. This is because, as you compress the gas from the ambient air pressure (1 bar) through to the pressure you’re putting into the tyre (say 5 bar), the molecules get excited and so they get warm. Thus while the bicycle pump is running, it is a heat pump.

Fridges are Heat Pumps

A fridge takes the ambient air pressure out of the kitchen, which is perhaps at 18 or 20 degrees, compresses that heat and radiates it out at the back of the fridge. That is why the back of a fridge feels warm, normally at about 40 degrees. In engineering there’s always an equal and opposite to everything, so as heat is generated, so is cold. With a fridge freezer, the cold is kept but the heat is thrown away. In this case that doesn’t matter because you probably want to heat the kitchen anyway. A ground source heat pump works in the same way, using the heat for heating the house and putting the cold back into the ground.

A Heat Pump Can Reduce Running Costs by up to Two Thirds

In Justin’s experience most people become interested in reducing their energy usage because of the cost. He has had clients with heating bills of up to £80,000 a year and typically they can reduce running costs by two thirds.

Even in a Period Property You Can Improve The Fabric of a Building

Insulating the loft is often a very good starting point and sometimes insulating the cellar is an option, too. Most Grade I listed buildings nowadays have shutters built in, which are extremely good insulators when used. Stopping draughts can make a big difference.

Use Old Buildings as They Were Originally Designed

If you’re in a big house, there may be part of the house that can be sealed off when not in use. Use the fireplaces. Some chimneys draw very well and don’t create any draughts in the house.

Secondary Glazing is Effective and Barely Noticed

Justin has leaded light windows with wooden frames, but in front of the old oak frames there is a single pane of glass with a very thin oak frame going round it. In this case it is the size of the whole window area, but most people don’t even realise it is there, because you think you’re looking at the original windows. This not only drastically reduces heat loss but also acts as a sound buffer.

The Cavity Wall is Left Uninsulated

Even though Justin’s property has a cavity wall, he refuses to insulate it. This is because he has an oak-framed house with beams that have stood for hundreds of years. If any damp bridging occurs the wood could rot within in a decade. So Justin chooses to use an extra 20% on heating his house so that he knows that the walls remain secure.

The House Stays at a Constant Temperature with Weather Compensation

The difference between this and traditional heating systems is that a stable temperature, in this case 20 degrees, is maintained all year round. That means that the walls are also at 20 degrees. Even if the outside temperature is -6, the inside walls stay at 20 degrees and actually act as a radiator. This therefore takes advantage of the thermal mass, which is a good quality. Around the time when the house was built, it would have been run in the same way. A fire would have been kept going throughout the day and temperatures would be fairly constant, even if significantly colder than how we live today (perhaps 15 or 16 degrees).

The Radiators Never Get Above 50 Degrees

Many people say that you need to oversize the radiators when using a ground source heat pump, but Justin is using the same radiators that were heating his house when it ran on oil. The difference is that with oil, you tend to switch the heating on and off, especially if you think you’re saving money. What Justin does is put in a lower grade of temperature but for a 24-hour period. So it’s all about maintaining the temperature. Rather than the radiators getting up to 70 or 80 degrees, his radiators probably never go above 45 or 50 degrees.

Heat Pumps Are Reliable

Justin explains that more could go wrong with a boiler than it can with a heat pump. When it’s done properly it should be just as reliable as a fridge and most people replace their fridges when the door handle falls off or the seal breaks rather than when the compressor malfunctions.

Problems Arise if You Don’t Understand Where The Energy Comes From

Some people perceive ground source heat pumps as magic, but there is an engineering reason why it works. You are taking a small amount of heat from a large area. For example if you tried to take half a million kilowatt hours out of a piece of land the size of a tennis court, it will turn into a block of ice. So you would need to take that half a million kilowatt hours out of a 5, 10, 15 or 20-acre field. The larger the better. The more the load is spread, the more efficient the system will be.

The Ground Must be Taken Into Account

There are many factors that must be understood before a system can be designed. For example, it matters how much water is in the ground, how much of a slope there is, what substance the ground is (e.g. clay, sand, shale, etc.). Different substances have different heating properties and different heat transfer ratios. So, it’s important to understand what they are and do the calculations properly. Equally it’s vital to make sure that the turbulence in the pipe is right so that you can extract the heat properly and that the flow pressures are right. Justin says it’s all about understanding pressure losses, heat curves and algorithms.

Ground loops being laid

Hydro Systems Can Payback Quickly

Justin suggests that you need to consider the renewable technology that will work for your particular situation, whatever that might be. For example, if there’s a stream with a good flow and a good drop in it, then a hydro system could have potential. The payback can be very quick.

Be Aware of Government Grants

In the UK, the government is bringing out the Renewable Heat Incentive. This will pay people to replace their oil fired boilers with heat pumps and biomass boilers to heat their houses. Those grants are looking like they’re going to be particularly generous. There is, of course, an upfront cost of installing the equipment.

Find Out More About isoenergy

Follow isoenergy on Twitter

Download a PDF of case studies

Transcript

Download a transcript of the interview with Justin Broadbent.

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- Email feedback@houseplanninghelp.com
Home Style Green Podcast

If you enjoy listening to the House Planning Help Podcast, then Ben recommends that you check out Home Style Green. Matthew Cutler-Welsh is based in New Zealand and is involved in green building there. He shares some invaluable information.

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February 26, 2013
HPH007 : A Client’s Perspective of Building an Eco House – with Tahir Sharif
Tahir Sharif talks about how he built up his knowledge in order to commission an energy efficient home, while Ben discovers some great thinking from the Home World Exhibition of 1981.

Interview with Tahir Sharif

Tahir explains that his build has taken nearly 7 years. He started the process in 2005 and, although a lot has changed along the way, he and his family have achieved their objectives. They have ended up with something that is beautiful, works for their family and has little in the way of heating or lighting requirement.

About The Project

Tahir’s plot had a farmhouse building on it which was in a very poor state of repair. Situated at the lowest point of the land and right by a stream, it was riddled with damp. It did not make economic sense to invest in this building to try and make it better, so the new house would be further up the hill while the existing one would be demolished. The new house needed to meet their needs as a family but also be something that would still feel comfortable when the kids had grown up and left. They also wanted a property that they would be able to afford to run, even in their 60s and 70s.

A Passivhaus Approach Made Sense

Although the house was not certified to the Passivhaus standard, Tahir embraced the methodology. He says Nick Grant from the AECB was a big influence on the project and advised Tahir to invest as much money as possible in the fabric of the building rather than buying kit or investing in renewables. By doing this he would be mitigating his energy usage in the first place.

‘The Code For Sustainable Homes’ Did Not Recognise a Fabric First Approach

Despite being a very energy efficient home – far above building regulations – Tahir found it difficult to meet Level 4 of The Code For Sustainable Homes. This is because the Code awards points according to the eco features of the house and thus you are penalised if you don’t buy kit. Tahir had to install bat boxes and bird boxes in order to reach Level 4, which he describes as insane.

The Government and Industry Not Helping The Consumer

Tahir stresses the importance of understanding for yourself how a building can perform. This is because the Government’s Code does not provide the right incentives and industry wants to sell you the gadgets. Although Tahir counts himself as lucky for finding the best approach he also reiterates how he talked to a lot of different people before he made any decisions.

Choosing an Architect

Tahir says he interviewed four different architects but went with a recommendation of Jon Broome Architects, a practice with low-impact building experience. Tahir says it was very important to him that he picked someone who he felt comfortable working with for 2 – 3 years. He liked the way that Jon didn’t impose anything on him, compared to other eco people he had met who were dogmatic in their approach. He says another great aspect of working with Jon was that he was always accessible as issues arose.

Take Every Opportunity to Build up Your Knowledge

The best way of learning is to visit other projects similar to yours. Tahir also visited suppliers, went to Eco Build every year and used websites such as The Green Building Forum and the AECB. He read countless books on the subject and now has a shelf full of them!

The UK Planning System is Adversarial

Tahir tells a story of how a friend in Switzerland started a house build in 2005 and finished in 2006. His friend went to the planning office, was told the parameters and environmental performance to meet, the plans were drawn up and then were stamped. In contrast the UK system wants you to put in the plans first before they knock them back. Time and money can quickly disappear. In Tahir’s case he was very thorough with the dialogue to make sure that all the issues were ironed out and that the plans stood a good chance of being accepted. However, when the plans were finally submitted after nearly two years, a completely different officer handled the application with a completely different viewpoint! He says he was gutted when it was turned down.

‘A Pattern Language’ by Christopher Alexander

This is a book that really helped Tahir understand how people interact with spaces. He used it to inform his floor plan.

Tahir’s Top Three Tips For Tackling a Custom Build Project
1. Learn as much as you can about building a house and about how you want to live in that house. Whatever kind of house you build, it has to be a working functional home first before it’s eco, mud brick or whatever else it is.
2. Assemble a team that you really believe in. Realise that you will be working with this team for a number of years, so if you have any doubts at the back of your mind, don’t hire that individual or company.
3. Stay determined. You will have challenges of one form or another, so expect them and try keep calm and carry on.
Transcript

Download a transcript of the interview with Tahir Sharif.

Homeworld (Home World) Exhibition – 1981

Ben Adam-Smith explains how he went to Milton Keynes to see an original eco home from 1981, which formed part of an exhibition looking at how we would be living in the future. The house had taken a fabric first approach! It had the high levels of insulation, the airtightness, the ventilation, etc. In other words this was a blueprint of a direction we could have taken back then. Thirty years on and it is still a minority of houses that have embraced this building method. Are we finally getting somewhere?

Read this more detailed article that Ben has researched about the Homeworld exhibition.

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October 23, 2012