The UK Committee for Climate Change report UK Housing Fit for the Future? (2019) highlights the need for greater levels of inspection and stricter enforcement of building standards, alongside demands that ‘as-built’ performance of UK homes must be better monitored. Without these measures (and stricter penalties for non-compliance), the 1.5 new homes planned for the next few years and the 29 million homes to be retrofitted will not perform as intended.
The RIBA has recently recommended that all member practices should offer to carry out post-occupancy evaluation (POE) as part of their standard service to clients. This could have major consequences for the housing industry and the built environment project teams associated with it. A new sustainability overlay to the RIBA Plan of Work is also in development that will include, for the first time, a POE contractual procedure.
Several urgent questions arise as POE becomes mainstream:
How should built-environment professionals and policy-makers develop and deliver housing POE as an in-built part of housing procurement?Is it affordable? Who should pay for POE – the client or the design team?What are the key procedures that need to be put in place and should they be regulated?Should the acquisition of appropriate skills to undertake POE be taught in validated programmes in Higher Education or only as professional CPD?What must be done to ensure that POE becomes routine?Do Assured Performance schemes like EnergieSprong make POE obsolete?In the current climate emergency, POE offers the housing industry a real opportunity to reduce carbon emissions from housing - for good.
This debate will mark the launch of a major new book on POE implementation, Housing Fit for Purpose: performance, feedback and learning by Fionn Stevenson. Copies will be available for purchase.
Chair:
Andy von Bradsky, Head of Architecture, Ministry of Housing, Communities & Local Government
Speakers:
Fionn Stevenson, The University of Sheffield and author of Housing Fit for Purpose: performance, feedback and learning (2019)
Claire Murray, Head of Sustainability, Levitt Bernstein - Architect
Katie Clemence, Max Fordhams, Chair of CIBSE Technology Committee - Engineer
Oliver Novakovic, Technical and Innovation Director, Barratt Developments PLC - Housing Developer
Emyr Poole, Homes England, Senior Projects Manager, Planning, Enabling and Development team - Government Policy Adviser
Venue: FCBStudios, 20 Tottenham Street, London W1T 4RG
Timing: Tuesday 17th September 2019, Debate 6.00 (for 6.30) – 8.30 pm
Drinks and networking - until 9.00 pm
This event is by invitation only. Please come and contribute to the discussion.
To attend please register by each attendee’s name on Eventbrite here
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