Beacon

Research tells us that New Zealand’s existing housing stock is substandard, especially when it comes to using energy efficiently to heat and run our homes. We know our homes are colder and damper than they need to be, but what we don’t know is the level of intervention required to bring our homes up to the benchmarks sent in Beacon’s HSS High Standard of Sustainability®.

It can be done

We know that homes which use far less energy can be built today. Our first live research project – the Waitakere NOW Home® used 33 percent less electricity than an average home and 45% less electricity than the tenants’ previous home. This was a substantial saving for the family living in the home.

Equally the Papakowhai Renovation project is showing that existing homes can be renovated to much higher levels of energy efficiency, with one case study home saving 44% on previous electricity bills.

Improving energy efficiency in existing homes

Our Energy Retrofit research will provide robust information to inform decision makers and actors in the value chain on how to cost effectively renovate New Zealand homes to a high standard of energy sustainability.

We’re tackling this in three ways.

1. Firstly we’re looking at how hard or easy it is to renovate the energy performance of different types of existing homes. Our houses were built significantly differently over the last century and each type poses different problems for energy retrofits.
2. Secondly we want to understand how different consumers see the energy performance of their home and respond to retrofit opportunities. Specifically we’re focusing on landlords, high energy users and recent home buyers.
3. Thirdly we’re using what we learned along with our experience in the HomeSmart Renovations project to build a series of energy retrofit packages that will provide effective improvements for each type of home and different consumer groups.