notes

In the 1960s the first rules appeared in the UK Building Regulations aimed at limiting heat loss in new buildings. With our climate more energy is required to keep buildings warm in cold weather than to cool them in hot weather. This is the case particularly in housing where houses have been built with central heating since the sixties but air conditioning is still the exception. With global warming this balance may be starting to change. To give ourselves a feel for the scope of the issue, here are some (approximate) numbers... Number of houses in England: 25M of which (to the nearest half-million)... <20 years old : 2.5M 20-30 years old : 2M 30-40 years old : 2M >40 years old : 18M Only 10% of houses can be described as new. Around 60% are owner-occupied, the rest rented or shared ownership. This ratio seems not to change much with the age of the house. Maximum allowable U-value (rate of heat loss) for external walls and typical heating load (for a 3-bedroom house) for new hous...

September 2021 has brought two crises to the UK. The price of natural gas has rocketed and, as a knock-on effect, the country's main supplier of carbon dioxide has stopped production. Both are the cause of anguish in parliament, in the papers and on TV: energy companies are going bankrupt, the government will eventually have to raise energy price caps, and the taxpayer is bailing out an American fertilizer company so we don't find ourselves short of fizzy drinks. Me? I have a different take on it all. In all the discussion over the last week or two I have heard no-one ask why, faced with increasing natural gas prices, CF Industries decided to stop producing CO2 rather than just charging more for it. And have they stopped producing fertilizers (CO2 being a profitable by-product)? One or two voices have suggested that it might be good if we were less reliant on gas - mostly imported  - while mostly it's 'Our heating bils are going to go up' or 'Two more energy com...