Project background
The building chosen for this project is an early 20th Century, mid-terraced house located near to Birmingham city centre. The house is owned by Balsall Heath Housing Cooperative, a social housing provider, and is currently occupied by a family. It has four bedrooms and a total heated floor area of 159m2. This house is typical of the type found in many parts of the industrial heartlands of the West Midlands; the proportion of pre-1919 homes in Birmingham is very high, at 33.7%, representing about 138,000 units, significantly higher than the national average of 22.1% and reflecting the city’s industrial history.
The challenges of older homes
Rear of property
The technical “hard-to-treat” challenge
The property is an extremely hard-to-treat property, with solid walls, little insulation and poorly fitted single glazing throughout. The property has undergone a number of recent (but typical) uninsulated extensions and modifications including a kitchen extension and a full loft conversion. Additional areas where heat is currently lost include a cellar and an external wall backing onto a side passageway. Although not listed, nor in a conservation area, the façade does have architectural values that the project will look to maintain.
The skills challenge
The project will overcome the technical challenge with a wide range of technologies and a whole-house approach, but these require multi-skilled contractors operating to high skill levels. The project will tackle the training and skills issue head-on, working with local contractors willing to undergo training and act as pilots for larger-scale skills programmes to be developed as part of the Birmingham Green New Deal.
The capital-and-maintenance cost challenge
We will addresses this challenge by focusing on (largely) established technologies, giving maximum potential for economies of scale in replication and scale-up, and minimum maintenance costs. The major innovations come from the whole-house approach and from developing integrated skills training, both of which can be cheaply and quickly replicated.
