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May 25 newsletter

Welcome to the second edition of the Welsh Zero Carbon Hwb newsletter.

We’re proud to be growing as a trusted source for case studies, a go-to training platform, and a knowledge hub for Wales’ housing decarbonisation community of practice. As we expand our communications and outreach, we’re excited about connecting with many of you at upcoming events throughout the year.

We’re also strengthening our national collaborations and will soon be launching a dedicated data dashboard to support local government stakeholders that have housing portfolios.

We’ll continue sharing updates, but make sure you’re following our LinkedIn page and are signed up to this newsletter to stay connected and informed about the latest zero carbon progress in Wales.

The Hwb presents at TAI 2025

TAI 2025 is CIH Cymru’s annual conference and exhibition and is highly regarded as a must-attend event in the Welsh housing calendar. We were delighted that Menna Lewis (TrustMark) was asked to present on Bridging the Skills Gap in Wales. Menna provided an overview of the Welsh Zero Carbon Hwb project and the e-learning course developed for housing association site inspectors and project managers. The course launched in November 2024 and is free of charge for the first 200 registrants.

Menna also highlighted the key challenges we are facing in Wales:

  • 1.5 million homes in Wales were identified through the 2021 census (240,000 of which are social housing). To meet the government targets that means over 142 homes require retrofitting per day (7 days a week) for the next 25 years.
  • Retrofitting 24.8 million homes in England and Wales will require the existing workforce to upskill while recognising a UK gap of 350,000 roles in domestic retrofit. For Wales we believe we need approximately 27,000 new retrofit roles by 2030.
  • It’s estimated that around 12% of Welsh households are in fuel poverty.
  • Work carried out needs to be compliant and meet required standards.
  • Our ageing workforce – a fifth of the construction workforce is aged 55 or over and most will have retired by 2030.
  • Lack of appetite to join the sector – we need to educate our younger population on the careers available.
  • Lack of suitably qualified lecturers and class size.
  • Balancing academic and practical learning.

We were joined at this session by Robin Staines, Local Government Delivery Programme Lead, and Fran Richley, Operations Manager from Eden Gate.

E-learning course

One of our key deliverables was to identify strategic skills and training priorities for delivering net zero carbon, including the design of a net zero training pilot for housing association site inspectors and project managers.

The course was launched in November 2024 and is free of charge for the first 200 registrants. There are currently 85 active leaners on the course. Don’t miss out on your free space. To register visit the e-learning page on the Welsh Zero Carbon Hwb website.

The training programme is available through our online e-learning platform and includes nine modules, each focusing on aspects of net zero housing.

1. Background to Welsh Social Housing Policies and Regulations

2. Foundation: An Introduction to Sustainable Building

3. PAS 2030/2035: Retrofit for Site Inspectors and Project Managers

4. Monitoring, Reporting and Reducing Carbon Emissions

5. Heat Pumps and Solar PV Guidelines

6 A. Airtightness: Retrofit of Homes

6 B. Heat Loss in New Build Homes

7. Modern Construction Methods for New Build Homes

8. Ventilation: Retrofit and New Build Homes

9. Building Performance Evaluation (BPE) in Practice

Feedback is currently being collated and will be finalised once the pilot comes to an end, to ensure that the programme delivers on the needs of both housing site managers and project managers.

We are thrilled to announce that modules two to nine of our training course have received accreditation from Continuing Professional Development (CPD). This recognition underscores the high quality and relevance of our educational content, ensuring that participants can confidently enhance their skills and knowledge. With CPD accreditation, our modules are now officially recognised as valuable contributions to professional growth and lifelong learning.

Finally, please ensure you review the additional courses available in Wales via:

Welsh Zero Carbon Hwb well received by the Retrofit Alliance of Nations

Ronan Doyle (Hwb Project Manager – Energy Saving Trust) and Julian Brooks (Hwb Work Package Lead – Good Homes Alliance) participated in a conference call chaired by the National Retrofit Hub. The meeting was hosted by our sister organisations across the four home nations plus the Republic of Ireland. These are Built Environment – Smarter Transformation (BE-ST), Sustainable Energy Authority of Ireland (SEAI), National Retrofit Hub (NRH), Welsh Zero Carbon Hwb, and the Northern Ireland Housing Executive (NIHE).

Within this forum we discussed initiatives, successes and challenges across the five nations. The meeting continued to find areas of common collaboration and opportunities for co-promotion whilst being firmly rooted in location-based delivery.

We presented a recent development from our data workstream. Consortium member, Energy Saving Trust, has customised their home analytics package to deliver address level data for use by our local authority stakeholders. After a pilot period it’s hoped that this application will prove to be a ‘game changer’ in terms of delivering a data set that can be interrogated to deliver a decarbonisation dashboard for both local authorities with a housing portfolio and registered social landlords.

Case studies

We are developing a multi-layered searchable database that will assist client groups and users to identify projects where different technologies, process and systems have been used to improve outcomes.

The case studies listed are currently a mix of detailed studies and summaries from the Welsh Government website.

If you are responsible for any of the case studies listed here and would like to add more relevant information, please get in touch with us using our case study submission form.

Hwb events update

We will be running two events during 2025. The first will be looking at the use of data to inform net zero outcomes and to help with decarbonisation strategies. It will focus on the data tools and dashboards that we will be hosting in 2025 from TrustMark & XRi and Energy Saving Trust Home Analytics.

Data analytics is a powerful tool for identifying maximum impact through interventions and can help identify trends and track progress at a nationwide level. The use and access to data is also an important factor to consider and we will explore this at the event.

The event is likely to be in Cardiff in July. The date and venue will be confirmed nearer the time.

Our second event will be in autumn 2025 and will focus on the reducing the impact of whole life and embodied carbon within the housing sector. As the operational energy use of homes and the carbon factor of the electricity grid reduces, more focus will be needed on the embedded carbon of materials, manufacturing, transport, end of life disposal, reuse etc.

This event will explore a wide range of topics including:

  • Newbuild vs refurbishment/conversions repurposing of buildings
  • Impacts that materials/products have on carbon
  • Timber and natural bio-based construction materials
  • Reuse of materials
  • Recycled materials
  • Lower carbon solutions that Wales could lead the way on.

The second event will be held in North Wales, in the autumn. The date and venue will be confirmed nearer the time.

Both events will include breakout sessions where we will be seeking views on how the topics being covered could help inform policy in Wales.

If you are interested in speaking at the events please get in touch with Julian Brooks.