Aiming to not only build a high quality, sustainable and energy efficient 21st centre housing, but also be flexible in meeting the potential requirement of tenants in the future, new council housing developments targeted to help regenerate certain area within the city and local communities.
Sustainable technologies and specifications, such as solar panels and triple glazed windows are applied to secure low running cost for tenants. From March 2010 to September 2011, 85 new low carbon houses have been built in the Northfield area of Aberdeen.
The Code for Sustainable Homes Level 5 is met by 16 four-bedroom houses and 12 three-bedroom flats. A ‘fabric-first’ approach together with additional micro-renewable technologies has also been adopted. The properties are benefit from reduced labour cost, faster building speed, as well as fewer maintenance issues in the future. The buildings achieved an initial air-tightness of 3m3/h/m2 @ 50Pa for each plot. The insulation is designed to reach U-value of 0.12 W/m2/k and a lambda value of 0.32. Additional renewable sources including air source heat pump, solar thermal panels, solar photovoltaic cells, mechanical ventilation heat recovery, grey water recycling for the flats and rain water harvesting for the houses are integrated to deliver further efficiency.
The new-build projects in Aberdeen City Council not only simply helped ease the housing waiting list and solve homeless issue in the city. Much more importantly, the low carbon buildings encourage sustainable communities for the benefit of current citizens and future generations. Further, more new homes have been planned by the council and work has started already.
