Development Director, Nick Gillott was invited to take part in a Property Leaders Forum hosted by The Insider magazine. The event sponsored by Blacks, CRT Property Investments, HLM Artchitects and Pegasus Group attracted eleven high profile property professionals covering the law, design, planning, development, construction and sales.
Nick and others debated whether the planning system encourages more sustainable buildings, the viability of retro-fitting for energy efficiency, how the new technologies are affecting development and who is driving the sustainability agenda, planners, developers, investors or occupiers.
Nick said, “You used to say to a client that you would get payback for energy efficient systems in about 15 years, now it’s a matter of months, but it is hard to innovate and propose new technologies when trying to compete in the market. Costs continue to rise, and most energy efficient systems have an additional expense”. Others in the debate made the point that planners are now influencing design and the end users are now also keen to meet latest technological advances but the balance between costs at the outset versus long-term savings remains a big issue.
Nick said further, “It needs a period of normality in the market and costs to level off both in general terms and also specifically for energy efficient systems for investors, occupiers and developers to totally get onboard with making these systems “standard fayre” in all new buildings, but it will come, and we should start really taking account of these now”.
