We are facing an energy crisis not seen for many decades. Prices have gone through the roof, putting immense pressure on the people who can least afford to pay. How can built environment professionals lessen the two-pronged blow that has the potential to de-stabilise economies and security? Other international economies are planning to uncouple the renewables market from gas prices, set targets to reduce consumption and manage a potential programme of energy rationing. Might we need to adopt similar measures alongside such things as the communal use of public buildings and the restriction of street lighting? Is it possible to change people’s behaviour pattern redefining the notion of ‘comfort’?
In this conversation, a panel of economists, scientists, and professional from the energy demand and supply sectors explore how we can lessen the immediate impact of the energy crisis and plan for a more resilient future? As with all these Conversations we would recommend you view or review the recording to get the full benefit of the panel contributions. We provide a short summary of the topics covered below.
In his introduction as chair of the conversation, Alasdair Young, Partner at Buro Happold Cities, asks: are we in danger of ‘wasting a good crisis’ if we don’t take longer term issues such as deep retrofit into account? In his view we have wasted the last 10 years already waiting for decisions on how to decarbonise our homes. Do short term fixes only put off the inevitable?
The panelists all take a differing perspective on answering this question. Unusually for a scientist who has spent much of his career analysing the performance of buildings, Bill Bordass of Usable Buildings chose to focus on the somewhat heretical notion that it would be more effective to focus on human behaviour around consumption rather than homes themselves. With an analysis of the attitudes that got us to where we are, how we are responding now and what ‘good’ might look like in the future, he presents actions that we can all take both individually and collectively to respond within our existing built environment.
By contrast, Richard Holt Director of Global Cities Research, Oxford Economics very much takes a city-centred approach. Comparing London and Paris he suggests the short-term impact of the energy price rises is softened more by central government subsidies than by any planning or technical response. In the longer term we have no option than to invest in a net-zero future. The key areas where cities can have an impact are in transport and buildings: with the latter still needing long term technical fixes to ensure a clear path. Transport, he predicts, will probably take the lead in ramping up how cities can respond to the energy crisis that won’t go away.
There is also some discussion about global energy supply and consumption and geopolitics. In particular Richard points out that The USA and China will have a dominant influence on if, how and when we reach net-zero. Alastair reminds us that although we may have turned away from fracking in the UK, we are still importing fracked gas from the USA to replace the global shortfall caused by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. And in France the impact of their nuclear base load and how this should have led to a decoupling of electricity from gas prices is also mentioned.
Karen Klomp is Principal Consultant, Sustainability at Turner & Townsend where she is the Programme Manager of the Mayor of London’s Retrofit Accelerator for Homes, helping to transform the way London upgrades its ageing and energy-inefficient housing to create warm, affordable, and ultra-low carbon homes. The programme has adopted Energiesprong, the Dutch standard for retrofitting homes and she explains the reasons for this choice. Firstly, MMC provides productivity and, hopefully in the long run, cost savings. It provides long-term performance guarantees to the occupants. Finally, it introduces the concept of a ‘comfort charge’, paid by the user to the housing provider. She provides examples of several pilot projects in this programme but readily admits that the costs are too high to make it immediately accessible to extensive roll-out. The programme is now trying to ‘stimulate the market’ by aggregating housing providers across a number of London Boroughs to see if they can achieve economies of scale. This has huge potential impact if it succeeds but the technical challenges are greater in the UK than in Holland where social housing typologies are much more limited and easier to retrofit.
Ian Cameron is Director of Customer Services and Innovation, UK Power Networks where his responsibilities include customer service, stakeholder engagement, innovation and facilitating Net Zero. He suggests it would be wrong to think of a single energy crisis but a balanced response to 3 distinct crises – recently joined by a fourth – cost, social support, the environment and, more recently, resilience. Regular customer surveys provide them with a picture of how attitudes to these change with external influence, but their aim is always to try and find investment that has an impact where the ‘curves of the Venn diagram intersect’. He gives a fascinating snapshot of how they plan generation, distribution and supply including renewables, storage import and export. In particular it is the predictions for future demand – 10 years ago they were anticipating much high take up of heat pumps for example – and how the electricity grid will need to change and grow to keep future crises at bay.
The subsequent audience conversation covers a number of additional topics – embodied carbon within retrofit planning and supply chain resilience. Variable tariffs and how the supplier and customer can use it to their advantage. The cost implications of deep retrofit. Decarbonisation planning and investment for homeowners. What cities of the future might look like when taking energy resilience into account.
This Conversation took place in March 2023. There is a huge amount to learn from a very experienced panel on this important and pressing topic.