Petworth House among historic buildings National Trust urges Government to insulate

Improving the energy efficiency of historic properties could reduce carbon emissions from the UK’s buildings by an estimated five per cent each year and generate £35 billion of output in the economy, while making homes warmer and cheaper to run, a new report commissioned by the National Trust, Peabody, Historic England, The Crown Estate and Grosvenor has found.

The ‘Heritage and Carbon’ report was published by the National Trust, Historic England, the Crown Estate and property companies Peabody and Grosvenor, which are calling on the government to implement a national retrofit strategy for these sites.

The organisations said an extra 105,000 workers, including plumbers, electricians and carpenters, were needed to make historic buildings more energy-efficient, more than double the number currently working on the issue.

At the moment, around a quarter of all homes and a third of commercial buildings are considered to be “historic”, as they were built before 1919.

This currently amounts to just under seven million properties in Britain.

“The UK needs a long-term national retrofit strategy, led by the Government, positively bringing together training, funding and standards to sensitively decarbonise our historic buildings,” said Tom Burrows, Grosvenor’s executive director of sustainability and innovation.

“Only then can we truly seize this opportunity to tackle a significant source of greenhouse emissions while protecting our much-loved built heritage.”

The call echoes one made by former energy minister Chris Skidmore, who has also proposed a national retrofit strategy, and comes as Chancellor Jeremy Hunt considers his plans for the Budget on March 15.

Currently, almost a fifth of UK emissions come from buildings, according to the UK Climate Change Committee (CCC) and Britain is said to have the leakiest housing stock in Europe, with as many as 19 million homes requiring better insulation.

“The potential to improve energy efficiency and decarbonise our housing stock is significant, Chris Hughes, an Engineers Without Borders ChangeMaker said.

“Thousands of houses were built in the same period using similar construction techniques and materials, which means they are likely to face the same issues. But this also means that appropriate, sustainable solutions can be applied on a grand scale (if the industry can respond to demand).”