Scottish Cities Alliance’s Post

Another day, another event. Today it was my first time attending BE-ST Fest, as I was particularly keen to attend, not only to see first-hand the stunning refurbishment of my local Paisley Town Hall, but more importantly for the launch of the Centre for Net Zero High Density Buildings. Funded by UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) [£4.5Million] the Centre will focus its efforts on contributing to the decarbonisation of urban places at pace, by investigating how to make buildings in heavily populated areas more energy-efficient to reduce carbon emissions, lower heating bills, and bring eco-friendly construction products to the market. The Centre will test new prototypes and retrofit buildings with low-carbon materials, heating and cooling systems, and energy storage technologies. The Centre for Net-Zero High Density Buildings is a research partnership that aims to make buildings in densely populated areas more energy efficient. The centre is based at the The University of Edinburgh's Edinburgh Futures Institute and is led by the university in collaboration with University of Glasgow, University of Strathclyde, Edinburgh Napier University and University of the West of Scotland and BE-ST, Scotland's innovation centre for net-zero built environments. Professor Sean Smith, Centre Lead, outlined the scale of the challenge ahead of us to not only retrofit Scotland's homes and wider built environment but also fulfil the promise of the Local Heat and Energy Efficiency Strategies (LHEES) completed by all Scottish local authorities earlier this year. The magnitude of the task is acute, and will require all of us, from SMEs to large corporations, local authorities, housing associations, national governments, universities and more to find deliverable solutions in a challenging fiscal environment, and Scottish Cities Alliance stands ready to do our part. Eve Jones Gillian McCallum Stephen Good Kirsty Duncan #highdensity #buildings #builtenvironment #netzero #netzerobuildings #retrofit