Future development and the need for sustainable affordable social housing: How do we get from here to there?

Buildings consume almost 40 per cent of energy reserves globally and produce around 30 per cent of greenhouse gases. ¹ Given this sizeable impact on our environment, it stands to reason that improvements must be made to minimise these effects, with a view to being carbon neutral and eventually striving to be carbon positive. Indeed in April 2019, the UK Green Building Council published ‘Net Zero Carbon Buildings: A Framework Definition’. This document provides a framework for the UK construction industry to transition new and existing buildings (at both the construction and operational stages) to net zero-carbon emissions by 2050. ²

With the UK housing crisis deepening, demand for housing is far exceeding the current supply. This has resulted in everything from temporary Portakabin villages being formed to former office blocks being poorly reconstituted to provide passable living spaces. ³

In 2019, Goldsmith Street, an experimental development of 100 or so council-built social houses in Norwich, set a new precedent for sustainable design in low-cost, large-scale, residential living. Its feat of innovation and populist appeal on a budget earned it the coveted 2019 Sterling Prize, the highest award in UK architecture. ⁴

A question might therefore be asked as to whether this should be a precedent to be expanded upon? The key principles of these types of builds are based in Passivhaus theory, which is a design practice based on creating a highly controlled thermal envelope and keenly regulated internal environment, including minimising any accidental air ingress and egress. This will all be mechanically controlled to optimise energy usage. ⁵

Aside from energy efficiency, house buyers and inhabitants have simple priorities: Is it enjoyable to live in? Is it aesthetically pleasing? This is where Goldsmith Street has bridged the gap between the traditional view of a terraced house and the future of housing, incorporating suitability within a veneer of quality and enjoyable design, which is immediately apparent in the short term as well as beneficial ecologically in the long term.

However, one of the barriers to achieving the above scenario is that in many cities in the UK the current knowledge level among designers and construction firms regarding environmental design is lacking. The reason? Economics. Firms are rarely tasked with incorporating environmental considerations as they are usually not high on the list of the most expendable layer of design when looking to value engineer a project. This means, for profitability purposes, it is better practice to focus on the less expendable areas, and if by chance the client is willing to invest in environmental design initiatives, then this can be incorporated.

That said, as the awareness of environmental challenges facing the population is increasing, legislation may arguably forcibly improve things with laws, or levees to incentivise those working at the coalface. Such an approach would then need to be coupled with strict enforcement, as poor enforcement and low environmental design standards result in wasted energy, higher bills and higher carbon dioxide emissions. At present, however, the existing legislative framework (i.e. building regulations and planning policy) does little to encourage real change on the ground towards creating sustainable and affordable social housing for low-income groups. For example, since 2006, there has been an ongoing debate about introducing a zero-carbon buildings standard. On 10 May 2016, the government after much debate decided to delete an amendment proposed by the House of Lords to the Housing and Planning Bill 2015 ⁶ to introduce a carbon compliance standard to new homes. ⁷ Notwithstanding this, however, more recently in October 2019, the government launched a consultation on creating stronger building regulations as a way to achieve a future homes standard. Views are being sought on how the building regulations should be changed to reduce the carbon footprint. The first part of the consultation covers Part L (Conservation of Fuel and Power) and Part F (Ventilation) of the Building Regulations to new buildings. ⁸ Consultation on this ended on 7 February 2020, and feedback is currently being analysed. The second part of the consultation will focus on existing domestic buildings and new and non-domestic buildings. The actual consultation is part of the government’s broader green housing revolution introduced on 1 October 2019, which includes a national design guide that developers must adhere to. ⁹ Clearly, under this umbrella, given the pressing need to build more houses, sustainable affordable housing should also take centre stage. Councils across the country clearly would like to provide environmentally friendly low-cost affordable housing but do not have the money to do so. It is anticipated that the future homes standard will be introduced in 2025 and implemented through the Building Regulations. The above process starts to deal with one side of the coin, however, whether enough affordable and sustainable homes can be created to meet the demand is another question yet to be fully explored.

In light of the above, the Goldsmith Street scheme is an interesting precedent as it was actually the result of an aborted ‘plan A’ to sell the site to a local housing development firm. They were unable to commit due to the financial landscape in 2012, and the alternative plan of creating a competition to design council-built housing was instead rolled out.

It is important to note that in relation to the economic cost of creating a sustainable design, the cost impact on designing Goldsmith Street with a highly honed ecological design ethos was relatively negligible. Though that said, environmental innovations and building practices are generally economically unviable for developers as they are mainly focused on their profit margins and there is little incentive from councils and governments in the form of tax relief which could promote more sustainable builds. The short-term costs are only half the story, though. The long-term benefits are such that fuel bills can reduce by up to 70 per cent on a traditional equivalent build. ¹⁰ In Goldsmith Street, the yearly heating bills are theoretically forecast at just £150 per year. ¹¹ Moreover, of significance is that the houses in Goldsmith Street were completed within budget at around £1,900 per square metre, to put it into perspective this is only around 10 per cent above the cost of a new build property that is fully building regulation compliant. ¹²

So how can we encourage Goldsmith Street to become the new normal? One way is to better educate students at University level as this can help give designers a head start when it comes to best practices in designing to reduce energy consumption and minimise environmental impact during the build period and post completion. Equally, b-techs and apprenticeships in College can familiarise students in the construction industry with environmental innovations from a base level.

This can then be further progressed by the companies they are eventually looking to be employed with, by encouragement from clients and government to incorporate minimum/higher standards of impactful environmental initiatives into their designs. In turn, the construction teams tasked with realising these projects should be equally as educated in the best practice details and methodologies to ensure high ecological standards.

In conclusion, therefore, using the case study of successful precedents such as Goldsmith Street, the various constituents within the construction industry – architects, designers, contractors, manufacturers, developers and even clients – could educate themselves and strive for less impactful and more positive builds. Further, the government could incentivise and support the inclusion of sustainable design features by allowing for more lenient or perhaps stricter planning conditions on them (as is currently being mooted by the government), promoting the usage by creating tighter minimum/higher standards to be met within new builds, which would in turn force designers and developers to conform to a new way of thinking and operating. Without this cultural shift, in attitude and approach in terms of what is acceptable, with government taking the lead, it is unlikely that low-cost affordable housing will ever be really sustainable or available across the country. It is something society should be striving for as it can make a real positive life impact to those living in this type of housing, while at the same time mitigating the impact on the environment for generations to come.