Low Carbon Community Led Housing
4th March 2020
With thanks to our partner - Cumbria Action for Sustainability - the Hub offered two events in January for groups and individuals to find out how to minimise the unwanted carbon impact of housing development and what to consider when designing and developing a scheme.
Both events were very popular with attendees hearing two very different approaches to tackling the climate emergency through housing design.
For hands-on lived experience, Chris Coates, founder member of Lancaster Co-housing, spoke with energy, honesty and commitment about the choices his group had made while they established their Passivhaus standard homes in Lancaster. Making the most of on-site renewable energy sources; diligent project supervision; super insulation to keep heating costs down; and the sharing of space and resources to reduce waste all feature in Chris’s narrative of one of the pioneer CLH projects in the country.
And, if that weren’t inspiring enough, a presentation about the Living Building Challenge set the scene for truly aspirational carbon negative housing in the future. This standard integrates principles of ‘place, water, energy, health and happiness, materials, equity and beauty’ - asking the challenging question ‘what if every single act of design and construction made the world a better place?’ This is the most rigorous benchmark of sustainability in the built environment. With thanks to Rod Hughes of 2020 Architects for presenting.