{"id":29455,"date":"2023-02-01T10:23:43","date_gmt":"2023-02-01T10:23:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.innovationnewsnetwork.com\/?p=29455"},"modified":"2023-02-01T10:23:43","modified_gmt":"2023-02-01T10:23:43","slug":"energy-efficient-homes-made-possible-with-retrofitting","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.innovationnewsnetwork.com\/energy-efficient-homes-made-possible-with-retrofitting\/29455\/","title":{"rendered":"Energy efficient homes made possible with retrofitting"},"content":{"rendered":"
The UK has some of the least energy efficient homes in Europe, with leaky homes across the country contributing to approximately 20% of UK carbon emissions annually. This is a significant percentage, underscoring the importance of making the country\u2019s homes more energy efficient. Prioritising the energy efficiency of homes is critical for helping meet the government\u2019s net zero by 2050 target<\/a>, but for this ambitious goal to be reached, a lot more work must be done.<\/p>\n Assisting in improving the energy efficiency of UK homes is The Retrofit Academy, which aims to train and develop 200,000 retrofitters by 2030. To find out more about the work of the organisation and how retrofitting will improve the energy efficiency of UK households, The Innovation Platform\u2019s<\/em> Emily Potts spoke to David Pierpoint, CEO of The Retrofit Academy.<\/p>\n The Retrofit Academy is a community interest company that aims to train 200,000 retrofitters by the end of the decade. We are doing this to assist with the endeavour of retrofitting 27 million homes within the next 27 years, as currently, there are not enough people that are trained to complete this enormous task. The existing workforce is busy due to increasing demand. Our organisation is therefore there to facilitate training enough people for this to be possible.<\/p>\n Not having enough people to carry out this task is the biggest barrier to delivering retrofit on the scale we need. Other barriers to delivering retrofit on this scale include access to finance and ensuring that work is carried out at a high standard.<\/p>\n The company has scaled quickly because the demand for retrofitters and energy efficient homes is also rapidly increasing. Founded seven years ago, the organisation has now trained around 2,500 people, but this is only one-hundredth of the way to achieving our goal. To extend the possibility that we will hit the 200,000 goal, we have started working with colleges and universities across the country so that they can also start training people.<\/p>\n Retrofit is improving existing homes to make them more energy efficient. The first step to this is to improve the doors, floors, windows, and walls to ensure that not as much heat escapes from them. In a typical house, if you turn the heating off on a cold day, the house will go cold quickly as heat will begin to leak out. Therefore, if the house is insulated so that the heat does not leak out, it will stay warm and therefore require less heat. The fabric of the building can be improved to the point where you do not need to heat it at all, except for perhaps the coldest of days.<\/p>\nWhat is The Retrofit Academy?<\/h3>\n
What is retrofit and how does it tackle climate change and fuel poverty?<\/h3>\n