Nottingham selected for revolutionary housing approach

Homes in Nottingham been selected as part of a UK first pilot to radically improve older houses using energy saving and energy generation measures.

Nottingham City Homes (NCH) has become the first in the UK to adopt the Dutch-pioneered “Energiesprong” - which upgrades a home with new outside walls and windows, a solar roof, and a state of the art heating system, all in a few days.

The systems sees a household pay an ‘Energy plan’ and maintain a flat rate cost for energy, which will not rise significantly when energy bills rise. The affordable model brings houses up to 2050 standards of energy efficiency, and is currently being rolled out in France, Germany, Luxembourg and the US.

Jane Urquhart, the council’s Planning, Housing & Heritage portfolio holder, said: “We’re very excited that Nottingham is at the forefront of this revolutionary approach, which can help tackle both fuel poverty and climate change. Many of our residents live in fuel poverty so creating more energy efficient homes to reduce people’s energy bills is a high priority for us. Our Greener HousiNG programme has seen over 6,000 hard-to-treat homes in both social and private sectors receive energy efficiency measures and this pilot will inform the next steps for our programme to tackle hard-to-treat housing.”

Nick Murphy, Nottingham City Homes chief executive, added: “While we’re delighted to be part of a UK-first pilot programme, it’s more important to us that we’re creating warmer, more energy efficient homes, which are cheaper to run for residents. The Greener HousiNG programme is dedicated to finding the most efficient and reliable solutions, to help us future proof our housing stock and tackle issues such as fuel poverty. As an added bonus the improvements will greatly improve the look and feel of the area.”

Other pioneering landlords in London, Essex and Devon are set to sign contracts over the next few months.