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Revolutionising house eco retrofitting
Salford University builds new pre-1920s terrace home
Building has commenced on a replica pre-1920s, traditional-style terrace property constructed within a three-storey, sealed testing chamber at the University of Salford.
To ensure the authenticity of the house, ISG, the project’s main contractor, is using a host of reclaimed building materials, including timbers, roof tiles and over 20,000 bricks from recently demolished North West terraced homes. The contractor will also be adopting traditional construction techniques and skills to create the replica property.
The Energy House, which will take around three months to build before being fitted out as a typical, functional 21st Century family home, is being constructed to test the energy efficiency of old housing stock.
A state-of-the-art laboratory is being built next to the house, which will control and monitor the effects of a range of external climatic conditions within the testing chamber, including rain, snow, wind and up to 80% humidity.
This way, researchers will be able to accurately monitor heat loss, domestic energy usage and CO2 emissions, providing an unrivalled insight into the efficiency of older homes within the UK. To accurately recreate the effect of an adjoining terrace property, ISG is actually building one and a half houses within the sealed chamber.
In addition to academic research, the Energy House will enable engineers, manufacturers, designers, architects, contractors and many other sections of the construction industry, the opportunity to rigorously test the effects of different materials, technologies, techniques and ideas in an infinitely controllable environment.
Designed from the outset with in-built flexibility, various elements of the building can be easily replaced and interchanged, providing highly meaningful real life measurements. For instance, the building will be switchable from a traditional central heating system with a hot water tank to a modern condensing boiler system. Other naturally occurring variables such as missing tiles, blocked chimneys and even a build-up of bird droppings on the roof can also be introduced into experiments to examine their impact on overall environmental performance.
One example of this ‘real-life’ research already set to be undertaken is how moss, leaves and other debris in open gutters complicates attempts to introduce cost effective rainwater-harvesting in older homes.
Steve Waterworth, the University of Salford’s Energy House Project Manager, says: “We estimate that the structure will be finished by October and we then have a four month programme to fit out both the house and laboratory.
“We aim to be fully operational by the end of January 2011 and will be presenting the first tranche of Energy House data at the UK’s first conference dedicated to the issue of sustainability and retro-fitting, being held at the University, in January.”
More information: www.research.salford.ac.uk/cms/news/article/?id=194
One Response to “Revolutionising house eco retrofitting”
ecoadmin says:
Jim Parker, regional managing director of main contractor ISG, says: “The Energy House represents a landmark development in the ongoing pursuit to minimise energy consumption and reduce the environmental impact of properties within the UK. The results of these pioneering experiments could prove hugely influential for homeowners, registered social landlords and organisations involved within the maintenance and refurbishment sectors.