More from BuilderScrap.com. Double glazing salesmen beware…. is your market all tapped out!

All respondents were asked what proportion of the windows in their home were double-glazed. Around three-quarters (76%) of all respondents said that all of the windows in their home were double-glazed, with 7% saying most, 3% saying about half and 3% saying some were double-glazed. Around one in ten respondents (9%) said that none of the windows in their home were double-glazed.

In 2007, 73% of respondents indicated that all of their outside windows and doors were double or secondary glazed, while 10% indicated that none of them were double or secondary glazed. This apparent difference between the current and 2007 surveys may be related to a difference in the question wording.

Those who said that half or less of the windows were double glazed were asked what types of windows they would be interested in getting or replacing. Respondents were asked to select responses from an answer list – people who lived in rented accommodation and those who had no responsibility for the upkeep of their home were excluded from this question. Of those who were asked, around half (45%) said they were interested in replacing single glazing with double glazing, 6% said they were interested in replacing old double-glazing with new improved double-glazing, and 3% said they were interested in getting new double-glazing for a new extension or renovation. Around four in ten (42%) said they were not interested in getting or replacing any of these types of glazing.

Not that surprising… although I thought with the amount of door to door salesmen trying to sell me double glazing and small contractors, the market would be flooded!

More on the frankly remarkable results from ‘home energy use’ Builders and Contractors take note. There is an opportunity here!

All respondents who had not installed cavity wall insulation, solid wall insulation or loft insulation (but were able to do so) were asked to say what the main reasons were for not doing so. Those who said they had not heard of that type of insulation and those who said it was not applicable to them were excluded from these questions.

Around 300 respondents (30% of those whose homes were constructed with cavity walls) had not installed cavity wall insulation. Respondents were most likely to say that they had not installed this form of insulation as they could not afford it (27%). Other key reasons provided included never having thought about it (14%), not knowing whether they had it already (11%), because they were waiting until they needed to do other major renovations (9%) and because it would take too long to get costs back through lower energy bills (7%).

Similar reasons were provided by the small proportion (16%) of respondents who had a loft but said they had not installed loft insulation or top-up loft insulation. Cost was the most frequently cited reason – a quarter (23%) said they could not afford to do this, 17% said they were waiting until they needed to do other major renovations, 15% had never thought about it, and 10% said that it required too much effort.

In contrast, respondents whose homes were constructed with solid walls were most likely to say that they had not installed solid wall insulation as they had never thought about it (27%). That said, cost was also a significant factor with one fifth saying that they could not afford to install this form of insulation (20%). Around one in ten indicated that they did not know if they already had it or not (11%) or that they did not know how to go about it or who to ask (8%).

This leads me to the question…. Does the government need to be more proactive when informing homeowners of energy saving options e.g. solid wall insulation. What about Government subsidies?

More from BuilderScrap.com on the recent Defra Survey. As a Builders Exchange we’re absolutely positive that you guys will know how well insulated your homes are…. check out the responses.

The survey also looked at home insulation. Again responses can be classified using the stages of change response scale. It should be noted that some respondents will have installed insulation or double glazing themselves but in many cases others will have moved into a property that already had insulation or double glazing. The group classified as “maintenance‟ in Table 7 includes both types of case.

It was most common for respondents (for whom it was practicable or relevant) to have already installed double glazing (89%) or loft insulation / top-up loft insulation (82%). Very few people were at the pre-contemplation stage (i.e. had either not heard of it or had not thought about doing this) or the rejection stage (i.e. had thought about it doing but had dismissed the idea). One in ten (10%) indicated that they were contemplating installing loft insulation or top-up loft insulation and 5% indicated that they were contemplating installing double glazing.

In the 2007 Defra survey a slightly higher proportion (94%) of respondents with lofts indicated that they had loft insulation. Similarly in tracker research carried out by the 28 Energy Saving Trust in August 2007, 94% of respondents indicated that they had at least some double-glazing, which is slightly higher than the 2009 survey. However, the question wording on these previous surveys was slightly different which may explain the apparent change – it seems improbable that the prevalence of loft insulation or double-glazing would have decreased over this period. In previous surveys respondents were asked simply whether they had any loft insulation in their home whereas in the current survey respondents were asked to respond using the stages of change scale described in this report.

Slightly more than half (57%) of those whose homes were constructed with cavity walls, had cavity wall insulation and around half of all respondents had draught exclusion for doors and or windows installed (46%). These levels are consistent with findings from previous research. The 2007 Defra survey showed that 59% of people in England who lived in homes with cavity walls had at least some cavity wall insulation. Research carried out by the Energy Saving Trust showed that 46% of people in England had draught exclusion in their homes. A relatively high proportion (19%) of respondents were at the pre-contemplation stage of installing draught exclusion suggesting that for many this was not something that they had considered.

Slightly more than one in ten (12%) of those whose homes were constructed with solid walls had solid wall insulation. Respondents were much more likely to be at the pre-contemplation stage for this behaviour – 31% were at this stage, indicating that a high proportion of those whose homes were constructed with solid walls “hadn’t really considered‟ this type of insulation. A relatively high proportion (21%) of respondents had rejected solid wall insulation as an option. There was also a high proportion of unclassified respondents due to people saying that this question was “not applicable‟ to them or because they did not know (31% of whose homes were constructed with solid walls).

Do you know about the construction of your own home?

At Interbuild 2009, BuilderScrap worked in collaboration with CCI, Envirolink and other prestigious organisations to develop a series of boards highlighting the different phases of Buildability.

Stage 1: Design and Specification

BuilderScrap is pleased to announce an exciting new collaboration with Construction Centre for Innovation North West (CCINW) and Salford University.  The partnership has been created in order to develop a technology to accurately measure the amount of carbon saved by members of the BuilderScrap website.

The BuilderScrap website launched a year ago and, at the time of writing, has 900 members using the site, a figure which is growing continually.  The website works simply, effectively, and is free to use.  Members can register and upload any leftover, surplus construction materials to the website.  Other members can then search for these materials, and contact the seller to make an exchange.  The website has been received very well by the construction industry, as this partnership with CCINW shows.  The initiative is supported by CCINW through the North West Opportunities Programme, which is linked to the region’s Carbon Reduction Targets.

The development of the ‘Carbon Calculator’ is still in the very early stages, and it is hoped that this will be up and running by the New Year.  The aim of the Calculator is to provide statistics on carbon reductions to the individual companies involved in an exchange, and also to local councils and corporate clients.

 BuilderScrap is pleased to be part of WRAP’s Halving Waste to Landfill commitment and is also partnered with Envirolink Northwest and Envirowise.The main benefit of using BuilderScrap, is that by encouraging reuse of surplus materials within the industry, less waste is sent unnecessarily to landfill, offering significant cost savings to the user.  The introduction of the Carbon Calculator service will allow members and corporate clients to quantifiably prove their individual savings, which can potentially help them to gain new clients and work and improve their Corporate Social Responsibility.

Well, we are back in the BuilderScrap office after a hectic few days at the Interbuild exhibition.  The show went really well, we met loads of interesting people and signed up a massive new 850 BuilderScrap users!  One of the best things about Interbuild is meeting people from all walks of the construction industry, and seeing how BuilderScrap can be o benefit to them.  We met with some major builders and contractors, councils, charities, colleges and self and home builders. 
We were also running a competition to win a weekend for two in the stunning Coach House Hotel in Chester.  The winner will be drawn next week, and announced on this blog, so watch this space if you entered the competition!
Sustainability Street was a major feature of the Interbuild show this year, with full size intelligent home, hotel pod and a classroom!  We at BuilderScrap were delighted to be involved with Sustainability Street through the display of several boards highlighting the process of Buildability - which will be discussed in a later post. 

The BuilderScrap team at Interbuild

Buildability Boards on Sustainability Street

The BuilderScrap team hard at work

This Defra survey looked at the types of actions that respondents said they were doing that directly reduce the amount of energy they were using in the home – for example, turning the heating down or boiling the kettle with a limited amount of water. Table 6 summarises the extent to which people had thought about, or tried each of these behaviours (using the stages of change response scale).  Here at BuilderScrap.com we look more at the reducing waste and energy on worldwide scale. Sharing, recycling and reclaiming building materials that otherwise would be sent to landfill…. therefore reducing costs.

Building Materials

The results show that most people said they were doing each of the five energy saving behaviours and intended to keep these up – few had tried the behaviours and later relapsed. Respondents were most likely to be doing and intending to keep doing the following behaviours:

• Only boiling the kettle with as much water as you need (84% said they had done this and intended to keep it up)
• Washing clothes at 40 degrees or less (77%)
• Cutting down on the use of gas and electricity at home (76%)

There had been a significant increase in those respondents who reported cutting down on the use of gas and electricity at home from 58% in the 2007 Defra survey to 76% in 2009. Fewer respondents reported turning down thermostats or cutting down on the use of hot water, though it was still a majority of respondents at 66% and 64% respectively.

For all five of the behaviours shown in Table 6, relatively small numbers of respondents reported relapsing (having tried the behaviour but stopped doing it) – 5% or less of respondents for each behaviour. Similarly, a relatively small proportion of respondents had rejected each behaviour before ever trying (between 3% and 9% of all respondents had rejected each of the five behaviours).

The majority of respondents had at least thought about adopting each of the five behaviours with only a small proportion being classified at the pre-contemplation stage (where they had either not heard of the behaviour or not thought about it). Just 6% of respondents were at the pre-contemplation stage for the first three behaviours shown (boiling the kettle with only as much water as you need, washing clothes at 40 degrees or less, and cutting down on the use of gas and electricity at home).

A larger proportion of respondents were either at the pre-contemplation stage (i.e. had either never heard of it or had not thought about doing it) or rejection stage (i.e. had thought about doing it but had dismissed the idea) for cutting down on the use of hot water at home (25% in total for both stages) and turning down thermostats (19% in total for both stages).

Here at BuilderScrap.com we’re looking at the actions people are taking to use less energy (primarily gas and electricity) in their homes and the extent to which saving energy in the home was seen as a priority. Any responsible building services company would be able to outline a plan that would detail energy saving in the home. Not only in the form of an energy efficiency rating but also the building materials and techniques used. Many of the questions covered in the previous post used the previously described stages of change response scales to assess willingness to adopt or adapt a behaviour.

Attitudes to saving energy in the home

All respondents were asked how much they agreed or disagreed with the statement “I don’t really give much thought to saving energy in my home‟. As shown in Figure 5, a large majority (77%) of respondents disagreed with this statement. Around one in seven (14%) respondents agreed with the statement. This represents a significant shift in response since 2007, when 62% disagreed with this statement and just under a quarter (23%) agreed.

Lets look at the priority people feel the Government should place on the environment compared with other issues. All respondents were asked to say what they thought were the most important issues the Government should be dealing with. This question was asked unprompted – respondents‟ spontaneous answers were coded to a list of options which were not seen by the respondent. Respondents were able to give as many answers as they liked. Table 5 below summarises responses to the question compared with responses from the 2007 Defra survey.

Perceptions of governement issues

The economy was the most frequently mentioned issue for this question with more than half (57%) of all respondents selecting this as an important issue for the Government. The proportion of respondents mentioning this as an important issue had increased very considerably from 8% in 2007. This was followed by unemployment, mentioned by 37% of respondents (up from 9% in 2007) and then the “Environment / Pollution‟, mentioned by 35% of all respondents (up from 20% in 2007).

Overall this makes the “Environment / Pollution‟ the third most frequently cited response to the question (it was the fourth in 2007), with more respondents mentioning this as an important issue for the Government than crime. It is also worth noting that the proportion of people who mentioned at least one issue related to the environment (including public transport) as being important had increased from 26% in 2007 to 41% in 2009.
It should be noted that while relatively few respondents mentioned global warming / climate change, or energy use / fuel efficiency / alternative fuels, it is probable that many respondents were thinking about these issues when they said the environment / pollution. As this question was unprompted, it is not possible to say what specific aspect of the environment respondents were thinking about.

None of the three responses given most frequently in 2007 were in the top three responses in 2009 – in 2007 they were crime (mentioned by 49% of respondents and now down to 32% in 2009), health / social services (46% down to 26% in 2009), and education (35% down to 24% in 2009).

Here at BuilderScrap.com we meet people who work for Builders Merchants and in Construction all the time…. It’s time for our own quick poll.

At BuilderScrap.com we wish our Builders Exchange site got the coverage it deserved.

Check out this post on persuading others… environmentally speaking!

The survey also included three statements to measure the extent to which respondents discussed environmental issues with people they knew, and encouraged other people to be environmentally-friendly (see Figure 4). For the first statement (”I’ve suggested improvements at my workplace/the place where I study to make it more environmentally friendly‟), analysis is limited to respondents who were working or studying at the time of the survey.

Builders Exchanges are great for recycling

Nearly half (45%) of respondents who were working or studying agreed that “I‟ve suggested improvements at my workplace/the place where I study to make it more environmentally friendly‟. A similar proportion (43%) of all respondents agreed that “I try to persuade people I know to be more environmentally friendly‟. More than one third (37%) agreed with the statement “I often talk to friends and family about the things they can do to help the environment‟, although for this statement a similar proportion (36%) disagreed. For each of the three statements around a quarter of respondents said they neither agreed nor disagreed.

In the 2007 Defra survey respondents were asked to indicate which, if any, of these three statements applied to them. In essence this is similar to expressing (any) level of agreement with the statements as presented in Figure 4. There has been an increase in the proportion of respondents who agreed with “I often talk to friends and family about the things they can do to help the environment‟ from 31% in 2007 to 37% in 2009. The results suggest a significant increase in those claiming that they try to persuade other people to be more environmentally friendly. In 2007 20% of respondents selected the statement “I try to persuade people I know to be more environmentally friendly‟ whereas in the current survey, 43% of respondents agreed with this. Similarly, in 2007 15% selected the statement “I‟ve suggested improvements at my workplace/the place where I study to make it more environmentally friendly‟, while 29% of all respondents in the current survey agreed with this (the equivalent of 45% of those who were working or studying).