This article is from page 27 of the 2008-01-01 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 27 JPG
HEALTHIER living environments and significant savings on energy bills are on their way to Clare after it was announced that the county will be the subject of an EU-funded en- ergy efficiency audit during January.
The audit of the county’s social housing stock follows a Government pledge to acquire 9,000 social hous- ing units nationally in 2008.
The aim of the two-year project, Advanced Ventilation- Approaches for Social Housing (AVASH), is to determine the best ventilation strat- egy for existing social housing units in order to achieve maximum energy efficiency, occupant comfort and sig- nificant reductions in energy bills for householders.
All data collected will be analysed and presented to social housing pro- viders who are considering upgrad-
ing their social housing stock by performing energy intelligent retro- fitting of individual dwellings and entire schemes.
“Existing social housing units in Clare consume a large amount of energy for heating with significant emissions of greenhouse gases from the burning of fossil fuels,” said Jay Stuart, who will lead the project.
“It’s important, therefore, to under- stand how the energy consumption
of existing dwellings can best be reduced whilst achieving a comfort- able and healthy environment for the occupants through good ventilation strategies.”
He also indicated that the audit would involve the assessment of a broad range of social housing, in- cluding family dwellings and dwell- ings for the elderly and the disabled.
“Advanced thermal imaging and pressure testing equipment will
be used to discover the state of the dwellings thermal insulation and lev- el of air tightness. Once this has been completed, computer simulations will be used to determine the best ventilation strategy for the dwelling type,’ he said.
Further information about the audit and Advanced Ventilation Approaches for Social Housing (AVASH) is available by emailing R.Southall@brighton.ac.uk