Osborne completes energy efficient affordable housing development
7 December 2007Osborne has recently completed an environmentally friendly £1.5m affordable housing development for Guinness Trust at Godstone, in Surrey. The fifteen units at Selbourne Square and the adjoining Lindley Road consist of eleven houses and four flats, built asrented and shared ownership accommodation for local residents.
The innovative development features Modern Methods Construction in the form of precision factory made timber frames with trussed rafters for the houses and a structural insulated panel system (SIPS), manufactured by Osborne’s subsidiary company, Innovare Systems Ltd, for the flats.
SIPS panels are manufactured off-site in a one step process by injecting CFC free polyurethane foam in between two skins of Oriented Strand Board. The resultant panel is lightweight, extremely strong and has excellent thermal performance values.
Where the SIPS system has been incorporated into the Osborne Demonstration House at the Building Research Establishment, in Watford, independent assessment of the house shows that the energy required for space heating is just one third of that required in the 2006 Building Regulations – and exceeds current Part L requirements for carbon emissions by 40%.
Solar panels have also been installed on all of the properties at Godstone, to reduce energy costs for water heating. The works initially required some demolition and site clearance, a new highway was required to meet planning requirements and particular attention had to be paid to tree protection around the site.
Heather Stoner, Area Development Manager at Guinness Trust comments; “Guinness Trust is pleased to work with Osborne on this development which promotes sustainable energy as well as providing much needed affordable homes.”
Osborne is currently building around 500 affordable new homes a year and as one of the UK’s leading providers of responsive repairs and planned maintenance services, maintains over 50,000 households in the southeast.
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