How green is ChaCo?

ChaCo’s houses are being built to the AECB standard. Compared with typical UK buildings of the same size and type, carbon emissions are likely to be reduced by 70%. In comparison, the widely known Passivhaus standard tends to reduce carbon emissions by 80% – but is significantly more expensive to implement and somewhat beyond our budget.

We are also planning to produce as much of our own electricity as possible, so all of our south-facing roofs will carry solar panels.

Our Transport Policy is written into the planning approval for the scheme and commits us to limiting the number of privately owned cars to about 8 and establishing a car-sharing scheme on site. Our aim is to promote low carbon modes of transport and each of our homes will have its own bike locker.

We’re also going to be sharing many of our other resources: lawn-mowers, power tools, a bike trailer etc. Our communal laundry will cope with all our washing with just a few washing machines, freeing up planetary resources, cash and space in our homes.