Retrofit Smart Homes

Ahead of our Residential Green Retrofit Conference we’ve been hearing from one of our event partners – Schneider Electric – on making the right decisions to tackle climate change…

Simpler. Easier. Wiser.

We all want to make the right decisions. To that end, consumers, enterprises and governments have joined forces to tackle climate change.

However, the reality is that we are limited by our understanding of the challenge ahead. We simply cannot make significant progress without smart data-driven technology to support us. Digital retrofits of homes must become a standard measure, alongside more traditional approaches such as insulation, if we are to have any chance of meeting our energy goals.

At least 117 million tons of UK emissions are created by wasted energy in a year – much of it due to design inefficiencies in British buildings.

While consumer technology and behaviour evolve at an ever-increasing pace, our built environment remains stuck in the past. The UK’s housing stock remains old and inefficient, with much of it built in the early half of the twentieth century. For this reason, the built environment represents almost half of the country’s carbon footprint and is the sector that’s crying out for action.

Achieving net zero homes is an urgent priority, with retrofitting representing the only feasible means of achieving it.

With 80% of 2050’s buildings already having been built, retrofitting projects that enable more efficient data usage can highlight energy efficiencies to reduce carbon emissions and minimise waste. Yet the environment isn’t the sole beneficiary. More and more, we are seeing how a focus on environmental efficiency and design contributes directly to longer business growth and greater savings.

Retrofit as standard

Retrofitting isn’t a new practice, but it is having fresh life breathed into it by a new generation of smart technologies. Retrofitting can take many forms, from simply fitting insulation or removing gas boilers and replacing them with heat pumps and heat networks. But, at its heart, it revolves around augmenting what already exists – extending the lifetime of old systems and enhancing their capabilities.

Not only this, but the practice of retrofitting is significantly cheaper than ripping out and replacing old systems wholesale – while achieving very similar efficiency benefits. In the UK, effective retrofitting will be our only means to hit net zero by 2050.

Becoming wiser to consume better

While all energy performance retrofits should be welcomed, we cannot hope to meet targets without an understanding of the individual challenge – greater insight will be fundamental. We know that the most effective strategy is not based solely on consumers to actively limit their energy consumption. It’s one where we give them a holistic understanding of the energy they are using and provide an equally convenient and cost-effective solution. The role of technology in our homes should be to contextualise and analyse our energy efficiency efforts to come up with a target goal that is achievable and healthy for us.

Intelligent systems – like smart heating and maintenance systems – provide access to more useful data building and reporting. This, in turn, helps building owners and managers identify efficiencies that could reduce carbon emissions and costs. Indeed, by tracking resources – such as water and energy usage – through IoT-capable smart sensors, properties and homeowners can streamline and improve building management and efficiency.

What’s more, homes retrofitted with smart sensors and systems open the door to on-site renewable energy generation sources such as solar.

The intermittency of these resources have been a barrier to domestic generation, but the latest building and storage systems make it far more
manageable. They enable consumers to become ‘prosumers’, where they can produce and sell energy generated on their property. This capability has already become an important selling point for prospective buyers.

In fact, research from WSP shows 51% of building administrators and property developers believe more innovation in renewable power generation and storage is needed for success in retrofit projects. In particular, almost half (48%) agree that solar power will provide the biggest
performance gain on retrofit projects in the next two years. Retrofitting will be key in enabling renewable technology to become cost-efficient and user friendly.

The fruits of sustainability

Sustainability in buildings is no longer simply an environmental imperative. Decarbonising property is good for business. There are myriad operational advantages resulting in energy costs being reduced across a company’s building estate. A smart infrastructure is also able to detect faults and problems before they can actually snowball into an expensive crisis. This process of predictive maintenance extends the longevity of buildings and their systems, and it significantly reduces repair costs compared to preventative or responsive methods.

There are other benefits to managing a sustainable property estate. Research by Schneider Electric and GreenBiz shows that companies which strive for sustainability are more likely to receive project funding and customer interest. Why this is, is no surprise – data from IPPR North shows that retrofitting homes in the north of England alone could create 77,000 new jobs in the region as well as 111,000 supply chain jobs across the UK by 2035.

What’s more, consumers are becoming increasingly aware of building efficiency – from both environmental and cost perspectives. A smarter building is more likely to attract interest from buyers than one that is ‘dumb’ and inefficient. Almost three-quarters (72%) of consumers want to live in homes with systems that make their tasks and lives easier. Household penetration of smart tech in the UK is expected to hit 63% by 2025, and half of multiple device owners are interested in purchasing a hub.

A whole new world of insight

Expectations for renewable generation at home are only growing and will be a key requirement of retrofit projects in the future. Yet what we are seeing is that despite most consumers owning a piece of smart technology, it isn’t revolutionising the way we live and how we save energy. In fact, it may potentially even be adding to our environmental footprint.

We need technology that enables unprecedented visibility over energy habits at home and provides objectives that consumers can easily understand and adjust their energy usage to meet. The importance of integration solutions, which connect and analyse data from a wide variety of smart products in the home, can’t be overstated. The goal of net zero homes will be achieved, but only in regular achievable steps rather than ambitious moon shots that don’t come to fruition. Once our homes have become truly intelligent, a realistic path to net zero will be revealed.

Retrofitting requires an upfront investment, but it’s one that quickly pays for itself in terms of saved costs, efficiency, security and property value. What’s more, it can be far more cost-effective than the alternative of ripping out and replacing existent systems. The addition of complementary, smart sensors and systems gives property owners and managers access to a whole new world of data. By truly understanding how a building functions on a data-level, you can transform a house into a power home.

Register for the Residential Green Retrofit Conference here: https://www.built-environment-networking.com/event/residential-green-retrofit/