The Institute has released a series of guides, titled ‘Building Opportunities for Business: Low Carbon Domestic Retrofit’. The guide series has been commissioned to help built environment businesses take advantage of the opportunities arising from the move towards a low carbon economy. It is predicted that £500 billion will be spent on retrofitting the UK's domestic buildings alone over the next 40 years.

Written by a range of leading academic and industry experts, the guides provide practical and commercially focused advice and best practice to businesses working across the built environment industry including architects, surveyors, builders, project managers, plumbers and electricians. You can access the guides via www.instituteforsustainability.org.uk/retrofitguides

Ian Short, Chief Executive at the Institute for Sustainability said: “Retrofitting buildings is one of the biggest jobs and growth opportunities in the UK. We have no choice but to make refurbishing our domestic housing stock a priority or we will not meet legal obligations to reduce CO₂ 
emissions. To make such large-scale changes, we need equally significant transformation in the industry. Built environment businesses need to learn new ways of doing things but perhaps more importantly understand how the low carbon agenda can mean new business and a higher turnover."  
 
The Institute’s guides have been developed through its FLASH programme, part-funded by the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) and in collaboration with the Technology Strategy Board. The programme aims to support a step-change in the built environment industry by engaging London Small and Medium-sized Enterprises (SMEs) with the commercial potential arising from low carbon building and retrofit – more than 600 businesses have joined FLASH to date. Through the Institute’s strategic partnership with the Technology Strategy Board, members can access learning from the UK’s leading retrofit demonstrator projects.
 
For more information on the FLASH programme click here