Housing Associations

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Sustainable homes

sunflowers and solar cells
The drive for sustainable homes and communities is a top priority, and social housing projects often lead the way to higher levels of achievement for energy, water and waste targets. To achieve these targets it is often necessary to use new methods of construction, new materials and new technology with the associated risks.

NHBC's experience of technical building risk and setting technical standards, positions us uniquely within the industry to balance the need to use new systems and technologies with the inherent risk of using these unproven solutions.

Research and best practice for the industry

The NHBC Foundation runs a continual programme of research to find practical solutions to enable us to build to high levels of sustainability. The Foundation publishes its research as a free service for the industry, much of which is of interest to providers of social housing. Recent publications can be found at http://www.nhbcfoundation.org.

To receive regular information on sustainability issues from NHBC, please subscribe to the eNews service at http://www.nhbc.co.uk/enews.

Contributing to Government policy and Building Regulations to support sustainable homes

NHBC's role is to improve the quality and standard of new homes with the aim of delivering greater levels of consumer protection to new homebuyers, homeowners and Registered Social Landlords (RSLs). To meet the sustainability challenge we must  ensure that targets are achievable, and allow time to prove new building methods and technologies.

To do this successfully, Government, industry and homebuyers/homeowners/RSLs must engage to develop the right approach, and NHBC is well place to bring these stakeholders together. One initiative is the recently established 'Zero Carbon Hub' (ZCH), which has the challenge of defining 'zero carbon', and establishing a roadmap and guidance to achieve this target.

NHBC has been instrumental in setting up the ZCH and further information can be found at http://www.zerocarbonhub.org.

Provide professional services to achieve more sustainable homes

NHBC assessed the first real homes to achieve full Code for Sustainable Homes certification, and is the assessor of the London Olympic Athletes' Village, the largest sustainable homes project in the UK, both of which are to Code level 4. .

NHBC has pioneered the practical application of Code assessment, and we know from experience that early involvement at the design stage facilitates an easier process to achieve target Code Levels.

Information on the NHBC's sustainability services can be found here.

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