100 Unintended consequences of policies to improve the energy efficiency of the UK housing stock

Abstract

16As a major sector contributing to the UK's greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, housing is an 17 important focus of Government policies to mitigate climate change. Current policy promotes 18 the application of a variety of energy efficiency measures to a diverse building stock, which 19 will likely lead to a wide range of unintended consequences. We have undertaken a scoping 20 review identifying more than 100 unintended consequences impacting building fabric, 21 population health and the environment, thus highlighting the urgent need for Government and 22 society to reconsider its approach. Many impacts are connected in complex relationships. Some 23 are negative, others possibly co-benefits for other objectives. While there are likely to be 24 unavoidable trade-offs between different domains affected and the emissions reduction policy, 25 a more integrated approach to decision making could ensure co-benefits are optimised, negative 26 impacts reduced and trade-offs are dealt with explicitly. Integrative methods can capture this 27 complexity and support a dynamic understanding of the effects of policies over time, bringing 28 together different kinds of knowledge in an improved decision-making process. We suggest 29 that participatory systems dynamics (PSD) with multi/inter-disciplinary stakeholders is likely 30 to offer a useful route forward, supporting cross-sectorial policy optimisation that places 31 reducing housing GHG emissions alongside other housing policy goals. 32 33 Introduction 34

Can the choice of building performance simulation tool significantly alter the level of predicted indoor overheating risk in London flats?

“…As the domestic sector has been responsible for a significant portion of the UK's energy use 12 , there has been a significant drive to reduce its carbon emissions through measures such as the increase of building thermal insulation and airtightness 13,14 . However, strategies that focus on winter thermal comfort rather than whole-year building performance may inevitably lead to the unintended consequence of potentially increasing summer indoor overheating risk 15 . Therefore, efforts must be made to ensure that the low-energy newly built and refurbished homes will provide a thermally comfortable environment over the whole year.…”

Building Schools for the Future: Lessons Learned From Performance Evaluations of Five Secondary Schools and Academies in England

“…The PROBE occupant surveys pointed to issues associated with thermal comfort, acoustics, perceived control, and the gap between building performance and user expectations . While dissatisfaction with IEQ may have various causes, potential conflicts between energy efficiency requirements and IEQ performance are of great interest in the context of new Building Regulations (Shrubsole et al, 2014). An example of these conflicts is the overheating issues uncovered in highly insulated and airtight new buildings (Larsen et al, 2012;Fabbri and Tronchin, 2015;Maivel et al, 2015).…”

Participatory system dynamics modelling for housing, energy and wellbeing interactions

“…This process enables the generation of a rich dynamic hypothesis, and supports model validation as well as shared learning (Vennix, 1996). Participatory sessions are usually structured with the help of GMB scripts (Scriptapedia, 2017). Scripts are best-practice examples for eliciting variables, causalities etc.…”