I attended one of the seminars on the Lighthouse by Potton, and the presenter was very cagey when the notion of costs came up. No ‘exact’ figures were given, just a series of ‘ball park’ figures. But as the questions rained down, it was clearly evident that there were a list of more ‘hidden’ costs, including additional fees for a Potton site manager (recommended), the ‘wind catcher’ was ‘extra’, most of the high tech energy devies were indeed ‘extra’. From my rough estimation, when you factor in a bit of land to errect the building, you were looking at £400,000………no wonder one 2 had been built last year according to the presenter, and one of those was the showhome!

“Land values are, in effect, arrived at as a residual (i.e. development value less costs, including remediation, constructions costs, Section 106 agreements and normal profit). This should not, therefore, distort investment decisions. Apart from providing certainty for the industry, this is another reason why there is an advantage in setting a clear timetable for future environmental regulation.”

While challenging, I believe that the financial and technological aspects of zero-carbon – which are getting most of the attention – are actually at the easier end of the scale. Changing the culture of the industry to actually achieve the required quality of construction, and educating the other parties involved – for example the estate agents and the public – are likely to be the most demanding aspects of the change. The following article on my Web site explains why, and also proposes the use of an integrated change management approach to address the issues: http://www.mikebriggs.org/html/zero_carbon.html

Near here there is an outline proposal for an eco-town for 15,000 houses (for 35,000+ people), shops, six schools, playing fields, a tram system, a new railway station, a bridge with houses over a main road, leisure facilities, etc. (The Weston-Otmoor proposal) They are trying to reduce car use, but at the same time are planning a large ‘park and ride’ area with regular busses/trams to Oxford and trains to London.

Ideally we want to know the energy cost of producing this eco-town, the energy cost of producing the same as an ordinary town, and then determine the time it would take to recover the difference between the two for different efficiencies of the eco-town relative to the same normal town. My County Councillor believes ‘never’!!!

Has anyone done the sums?