It’s been a challange to “complete” the renovations to our home, and we recently got assessed by the Sustainable Energy Academy resulting in being given “Superhome” status – a greater than 60% reduction in the house’s CO2 footprint. Infact we obtain 79% reduction. This got covered by BBC South Today inconjunction with Winchester City Council’s [...]

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Apologies to all. Things got really busy towards the end of the year and my focus is on our Greening Campaign “Love Your Own Food” Event at Colden Common School. I will be updating the blog with the other stages that we went through. The good news is that we got planning permission for phase [...]

Sorry – this is a bit boring ! Insulation, Insulation Insulation! Celotex is 1.2m long and if the space is larger then 2 pieces are required. This clip show you how we did it.

Day 3 consisted of more insulation laying and plumbing work to accomodate rainwater harvesting and a more efficient hot water supply. In particular, a hot water supply to the wasking machine (which only has cold at the moment) via a special mixer tap. This will reduce the amount of electricity used for heating the water. [...]

In order to make progress on the sitting room, all the services need to be in place before we can lay down the insulation. Day 1 was electrics; Day 2 is the plumbing. (Day 3 will be wiring for the TV.) Lessons learnt: Make sure you identify all the items that are stopping you from [...]

The first step of the plan has started with emptying the Garage and Sitting Room for the following reasons :- Electrics & plumbing for the utility room, sitting room and extension. Insulation under the sitting room, utility room walls & ceiling. Changes required for the wood buring stove. Plumbing changes for future rain water harvesting. [...]

So far, its been intensive planning and lining up the various trades. The video below gives a quick summary. However, problems on the planning permission front. Take a look here

This will be my last blog entry for the Guardian since the team are now focussed on the December Climate Change Summit in Copenhagen – you can still follow what we are doing to our property at www.greenhomediary.com We will also be setting up a webcam so that you can see what is happening in [...]

The news this week on the Veck ECO Refurb is that we have employed an ECO Architect – the same one that is working on Ann Link’s house. There was lots of enthusiasm from local architects, and some fixed price offers from remote practitioners. I have also been to the National Self Build & Renovation [...]