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The Home of Self Build, Custom Build & Renovation
• 67,000 sq. ft. year-round resource centre with 200+ stands
• Independent advice on everything from planning to plastering
• Self Build courses, exhibitions and Architect consultation days
• Free entry, plenty of parking and easy access just off the M4
These episodes will investigate various subjects in more detail, with expert guests, and previewing upcoming shows and events to help you with your potential or current self build and renovation projects.
Welcome.
Good afternoon.
Yeah, it is.
It's past that witching hour, isn't it?
So good afternoon and
welcome to episode three of
Self-Build and Renovation Live by NSBRC.
This time we're talking
about heating and energy.
So it was fairly obvious who
our guests were going to be for this one.
One is a familiar face to
the episodes already,
and that is Rob Bone.
Hello, mate.
Hi, Chris.
Nice to see you again.
And good to see you.
Independent heating and
energy consultant with CLPM.
That's right.
That's right.
I had to take a run up.
I know.
People often get letters in
the wrong way around.
It's quite easy to do.
But yeah, CLPM Limited.
Yes.
and of course a help desk
expert and a presenter here
at NSBRC as well.
Yes and also a course
presenter as well so I do
presentations at the shows
but also I do the third day
on the self-build course
which is about heating
sustainability and also I
do the day course which is the renovation
Of course.
You're busy in a couple of weeks then.
Yeah, I'm always busy.
Absolutely.
And you can see one of my
previous projects in the background,
obviously.
Yes, of course.
This was deliberately for
this location this time is
that we are right next to
our next guest's stand exhibit.
I think that's the right phrase.
But the big one is, yes,
the renovation house,
which is such a core asset
and feature for this location.
Absolutely.
People always connect to the
Harry Potter house.
Yes.
It's almost like a film set.
It's really, really well done.
It's superb, yeah.
But you get to see a lot
more of it than you do of
the Harry Potter house, I believe,
because a lot of it you
have to just peek through bits.
Yeah, absolutely.
We're here.
You can get on your hands
and knees and have a proper crawl through,
actually, if you really, really want to.
But no, it is superb.
It's really, really well done.
It's not advised, though, is it?
No, I don't know.
You might snag your knees or something.
And of course,
delighted to welcome for the
first time to one of these
episodes is Clarissa Uden,
Associate Director of Total
Home Environment,
the stand we've got here.
Welcome, Clarissa.
Thank you very much for having us.
Now, explain, first of all,
which way shall I do this?
Total Home Environment.
Speak to us about Total Home Environment.
Well,
Total Home Environment have been
going since nineteen ninety
eight and we basically design,
supply and install
sustainable technology to
put into new build and renovation homes.
So things like heat recovery ventilation,
heat pump ventilation,
compact service units and
central vacuum systems,
everything to keep your home as healthy,
clean and sustainable as possible.
And I mean,
that is a walk in living exhibit here,
isn't it?
That you get to see it.
And I have to say,
you can probably see in the background,
there's just like bits of blue,
what would I call that?
Ribbon.
Ribbon, yeah, thank you.
Blue ribbon fluttering in the breeze.
The cool air coming out of
that is quite incredible.
Yes.
So at the moment,
the supply air that's going
into bedrooms and living rooms is heat.
So that will be up to about
forty five degrees.
And the heat pump technology
gets so much energy out of
the air that it's probably
pumping it out on the exhaust.
at about six degrees, seven degrees.
So it's very energy efficient.
I mean,
it basically works like your fridge,
but in reverse mostly.
Of course,
that unit can be reversed also
to provide cooling into the supply air.
Oh, okay.
Because that's what I've
only just noticed is
because we were busy
setting the studio up today, weren't we?
That, yeah,
the ribbons on the blue side
are fluttering outwards.
The red ribbons are fluttering inwards.
I should have noticed that straight away.
I know.
Forgive me.
I was busy,
but it's brilliant how it shows
that one off.
OK,
we're going to go into more detail on
all of this,
but I want to also what's your background,
Clarissa?
Well,
I was trained as a chartered surveyor.
And then about three or four years in,
I was helping my then boyfriend,
who's now my husband,
set up his business.
And I ended up actually
enjoying working for him.
at weekends, et cetera,
more so than I was with my surveying.
But luckily,
everything that I've learned
as a surveyor,
I've been able to transfer across.
So I have been of a little bit of use.
Yeah.
Yeah,
I was just thinking that's a good
knowledge set to take with
you into that that would be
missing if you hadn't done that.
Yeah, I mean,
I've got not endless amounts of knowledge,
but I am fairly competent
at construction.
I know what developers are
going through because I was
in development land as well.
and new build homes.
I've done a renovation of my own.
We've built our business
unit over in Morton in Marsh as well.
So I've done it from a new
build commercial and my own
renovation experience.
I love that.
I'm trying to work out
whether it's gamekeeper
turned hunter or hunter
turned gamekeeper.
I'm not sure which way round that would be,
but certainly that's an
interesting change there.
Okay.
Going straight into it then,
what are the typical,
and I'm going to come to you, Clarissa,
on this one to start with,
what are the typical
questions that you are asked?
Because this now gives me an
insight into what people
are thinking by the time
they come to speak to you.
What sort of questions do
they come to you with?
Well,
most of the time they are sort of
aware of things like heat
recovery ventilation,
but they don't quite
understand how it works and
how it fits into the house.
Sometimes they're like, oh,
the unit's quite big and
all this sort of thing,
and where is that going to fit?
Can I turn it off?
Can I still keep my windows open?
That sort of thing.
And then when they talk
about how they're going to
be building their home,
whether if it's something
like SIPS or ICF or some
timber frame where it's
sort of manufactured off
site so you can get your
air tightness up to scratch.
Then they start
understanding the concept
of heat pump ventilation,
which is basically for very
well insulated and airtight homes.
And then they can start to
get excited about the fact that they
might not necessarily have
to have an external air source heat pump,
which is the next best thing, basically,
with underfloor heating.
Because if their heat load is so low,
do they actually need a
formal heating system?
Because I'm interested in
picking up on that phrase
you just used there, a tight house.
And yet,
I've heard lots of comments where
they're trying to make sure
there is gaps for air to get in or out.
Yeah.
Well,
the government with the building
regulations have been
trying to get people to
make their homes much more
well insulated and airtight
because of fuel poverty and
bills being high.
So if you do have gaps around your house,
you are literally, you know,
with trickle vents or
extractor fans or opening windows,
all that heat that you've
just paid for is now going
to be expelled outside and
you're going to have to pay
for it again and again and again.
So there are ventilation
systems out there that rely
specifically on having gaps in your house,
because if you've got a
renovation or something,
you might not be able to
seal everything up.
But at the end of the day,
if you can make your home well sealed,
then you're going to reduce
your heating bills,
which has only got to be a plus point.
Well,
turning to the man that's background
was he,
your kind of fighter turned coach
these days, aren't you?
Absolutely, yeah.
I probably am your sort of
poach come game keeper, actually,
to tell the truth.
Because I came from being a
contractor to now being on
the other side to advising
people to what to do.
And what people like about
us is our independence.
So we have no affiliation to
any supplier or contractor.
So people like that because they say, well,
which one shall I go for?
What shall I do?
And then we said, well, look,
these are the options,
but these are also the implications.
So Clarissa was very rightly
saying that going down the
route of these systems is
absolutely fantastic.
But you must understand the
implications of that,
that not every house will
suit or every person will suit.
So if you're renovating your
house to get it to a level
of performance where this
kind of system works is
quite difficult and tricky to do.
And a new build is much easier.
So it's finding the right
system for the right person
in the right house, which is a really,
really critical point.
So, yeah, I mean,
I do feel a little bit for
the average person today
because there are so many
different options.
And it's getting the right
option for the right person
and the right house,
even the right type of house.
I mean, as I said before,
renovating a house to the
kind of standard you want
to get to to get to the
high levels of performance
is eminently feasible.
But it takes a lot more time,
a lot of good quality work,
and a lot more cost.
So there's always that case.
There's always going to be
this sort of balancing act.
And to find where you are in
that balancing act.
I mean,
I do find people come to me and say, oh,
they start off saying,
this is what I'll go for.
And you go, great, OK, fine, right.
If you want to go with that situation,
perfect.
But these are things you
have to think about at the
end of the day for it to
work and be suitable.
Because I always say to people,
you can read online that heating systems,
heat pumps and the like,
they are rubbish.
You can also read online
that they're brilliant.
Both statements are completely,
utterly true.
It depends on the application.
The right equipment in the right scenario,
brilliant.
The wrong equipment in the wrong scenario,
forget it.
Yeah,
one size fits all is not a scenario
that we would ever advocate.
There are so many different
technologies out there and
they've all got their niche.
They're all appropriate for
different applications.
You know, when you've got really small
flats or you've got
townhouses having an air
source heat pump is going
to be trickier to put in
because where's the air
source heat pump going to
go sometimes on a block of
flats it will have to go on
the roof but then you've
possibly got planning
issues there if you've got
a townhouse do you actually
really want an air source
heat pump in the summertime
heating up your hot water
and making a noise where
you're trying to have your
barbecue outside and in
that case no you've got to
go down a different avenue
and so you know with the government's
sort of pushing pushing
pushing for air source heat
pumps yes in a lot of
scenarios an air source
heat pump is going to be
appropriate but it cannot
be the be all and end all
so presumably those
questions that we referred
to a minute ago are that it
would be coming to you with
the plans of what is either
happened or happening to
then be able to establish
what's the best way to go
And are you able, is your, forgive me,
and actually it's quite
good because it means that
you get to explain it,
is do you have all of those
different solutions
available to them or is it
that you would sort of go, no,
you need to go and speak to
these people instead?
We're not afraid of saying
no because we would only
put a design through
of what we would do if that
home was going to be our home.
And we do have various scenarios.
We've got plain heat recovery ventilation.
We've got the heat pump ventilation.
We also do air source heat
pumps as well through a partner company.
And we've got a compact
service unit that does heat
recovery ventilation, space heating,
space cooling and domestic hot water.
all in one compact unit,
which is really good for
small townhouses and flats
where space is at a premium.
But we're not afraid of going,
do you know what?
Don't go for this.
You need to go and see a
ground source heat pump.
Which is what we need,
is that independent advice that's not...
I don't know the easiest phrase to use,
trying to get a sale at all costs.
It's like, no, it's have a look and go,
what is going to work?
And you guys as experts are
the ones that are able to sit back and go,
will that work here?
Yes, it would because of this or no,
you need to go and speak to these people.
Yeah,
I think that's a really good
reflection of the
self-build industry as a whole.
We're much more
consultative and we you know
a lot of us have done our
own renovations and new
builds so we know the pain
as you were saying well
about there's so many
decisions to make oh my god
yeah yeah yeah
I often say with people,
when you're doing your own project,
you actually get project
fatigue because there's so
many questions that you
need to think about, so many answers that,
you know, what we can do about this, this,
this, and this.
But all I will do is say to people,
if you are thinking about
going any particular route,
do your planning.
What I get, I get alarmed at,
and I work here at the help
desk quite frequently,
and people come to me and say, oh,
what do you think about this, this, this?
And I go, hang on,
let's go a couple of steps back.
Where are you?
And so we've done this, this, this.
Well, hang on a minute.
Had you thought about such
and such and such and such?
No.
You know,
you're a little bit too far ahead.
You know,
you've got to do this planning early on.
So if you want to go down a specific route,
you have to do the thinking
about it at design stage.
You don't say build a house and go, oh,
great.
We've built the house.
How are we going to heat it?
And that's a mistake that people, a lot of,
a lot of people do is they're focusing,
you know,
even focusing on what the
kitchen is going to be like.
Great.
Uh,
but you haven't even thought about how
you're going to heat the house.
No, honestly, it happens all the time.
Um, and,
and I get quite alarmed at this
and I try to say, look,
you've got to stop.
You've got to take a couple
of steps back and rethink
this because if you're not,
you're going to make self a
dreadful mistake.
So plan, plan, plan, plan.
It's all in the planning at
the early stages.
And so rather than thinking about, oh,
we've built our house,
how are we going to heat it?
You should be at the design
stage when you're planning
to design your house.
What are your heating options?
What can we do?
Because if you light a fit
on these wonderful bits of
equipment in your house,
it has an impact.
Where's it going to go?
I see this so many times where people say,
oh, this is my plant room.
And you're going, is this it?
They go, yeah.
Well, who's designed this?
Well,
the architect said it should be this big.
I said,
it needs to be at least twice as
big as this.
And I've seen this, unfortunately,
on a regular basis.
And they're building the house.
And they go, well,
we've got nowhere to put this stuff.
I know when I do presentations and,
you know,
you do question answer sessions
and then they say,
what's your biggest tip for
a self-builder?
And I always say,
build a decent sized plant room,
get everything in there from your meters,
your ventilation systems,
your hot water cylinders, central vacuums,
whatever it happens to be,
get it all in there.
And then it's one place for
all the servicing to get done.
And if somebody else has
come up with the plant room thing,
we say spend as much of
your budget as possible on
the fabric of your building.
So then you don't need to
spend as much heating it.
I had one with a lady,
it's a few years ago now,
and I got caught in quite
late on a project.
And they had this tiny little plant room.
And I said, we need to have this bigger.
And she said, well,
I don't want to lose space in my pantry.
I said, well, you're going to have to.
She said, no, no, adamantly,
my pantry is this big.
This is how it's going to be.
I said, okay, well, you have a choice.
She said, what's that?
Do you want heating or hot water?
She said, well, I want both, obviously.
I said, well, you can't.
Well, why not?
Because there's not space.
We cannot physically go.
That was a ground source heat pump,
which takes a fair bit of room up.
Exactly.
And I said, I'm sorry, but physically,
space-wise, we need more space.
So you're going to have to
have the choice.
So we had to have a smaller pantry,
simple as that.
But at one point,
she was quite adamant until
I gave her the ultimate choice and said,
literally, it's one or the other.
Hilarious.
And I'd love to pick up on
this because if someone's
just jumped into this
episode and they're hearing all of that,
it's easy to fall back into the overwhelm.
And it's like Harvey made a
brilliant comment in episode two,
the previous episode, where he said,
build a team around you
that are experts in their field,
which is where, again,
you guys come in as examples of this.
And everything will be right
from the outset.
Spend more time on that outset.
Get it all right.
Don't think you need to know
all the answers from the get-go.
Build that team around you.
Get all the answers.
Get all the planning.
Get everything done.
and it will then be plain
sailing from them
absolutely also you've got
to have a holistic view of
the whole project yeah
because what you're careful
with what we have is that
if you change one thing it
can have an impact on
another thing so you have
to have a view of that so
if you are say for example
you know going to go with
you know the kind of
ventilation with heat
recovery your air tightness
the building has to be very
good okay for that to
happen so you have to start
at that point where if you
don't go for that air
tightness then it won't work
So that's why you start
having to change things.
If someone says, well, actually,
now we're not going to go
with a high-tech house because of X, Y, Z,
well, hang on a minute,
it's going to affect what
ventilation system you can have.
But also,
what people don't realize is that
ventilation losses, as we call it,
can be up to thirty percent
of your heating loss.
Up to thirty percent on a windy day, cold,
windy day.
So therefore,
what that means is if you're
not going for the high-tech
in an airtight house,
your heating unit needs to be bigger.
understand me yeah and
therefore all of a sudden
your heating bills are
going to be bigger and so
on and so forth so it's all
indirectly connected may
have an impact on your
power supply requirements
there's a whole whole host
of things that are
interconnected so you have
to start off with your your
wish list and work out how
that interjects with everything else
I know there's so much
technology out there that
you can get a bit trigger happy and go,
oh, I must have solar panels.
I must have PV.
I must have heat pumps.
I must have a heat recovery ventilation.
I must have a smart home hub.
And before you know it,
all your budget's gone and
you've got nothing to
actually build a quality
home because you can put
things in afterwards.
You can put in your spangly
kitchen or bathroom in afterwards.
Just go for something
slightly cheaper to start
off with until you save the money again.
Sure.
Um, you can add batteries.
to your solar PV at a later date,
just make sure that you
prepare and you've got all
the infrastructure for them at the time.
But you almost need to go
through a season to know how much PV,
how much electricity you're
actually gonna make before
you decide on the size
batteries that you're going to need.
And is PV going to be appropriate?
Have you got loads of trees around you?
Are you in a valley where
you don't get much sun?
Is it then worth spending
money on something like that?
So coming to the NSBRC,
is a really good way of
doing your research without
you even feeling that
you're doing research
because you've got all
these exhibits here where
you can most of the time come round,
look at things in your own time,
It's open all the time,
so it's not a specific date.
And then, of course,
what we're going to be discussing,
I assume, is about the October show,
where all these exhibits
will actually be manned,
so you can speak to people specifically,
you can show them your floor plans,
get relevant advice,
and you can see the sort of
products and technology
that you could put into
your home and see if it's
going to be appropriate.
Because I almost get the
impression that you can...
go looking at all the
possibilities and bring it
together and then revisit
the plans or you do the plans.
But what you can't do is
suddenly introduce all this
technology a lot further down the line.
Absolutely.
Because those plans that you
did back then.
That's when it goes wrong.
Yeah.
And, you know,
we spoke with Tom McSherry last time.
Budget suddenly changed.
You touched on it as well.
Oh, absolutely.
Yes.
And then you're upset.
I like your comment, actually.
That's an interesting one
that says maybe you don't
have the perfect bathroom
or the perfect kitchen right now.
You have the functioning one,
but the beautiful one is in
year two or something like that.
And it's okay to build that in.
I always start off with
people really early in
their projects and say, right,
what you need to do is draw
up a piece of paper right
across the top budget,
draw a line down the middle.
One side put needs and the
other side put wants.
So needs are the things which are really,
really important to you.
It may be the kitchen.
Okay.
But I would hope it's going
to be the fabric of the building.
Because when you renovate a
house or you build a house,
you've got one shot to get this right.
So putting the money into the stuff,
which is going to be really,
really important in terms of the fabric,
the ventilation, the heating,
you're never going to be
changing that ever again.
The trouble is, I say,
we're all guilty of liking shiny things,
aren't we?
And we are, aren't we?
We're all magpies.
Well, exactly.
Of course we are.
We're all shiny, spangly things.
And so, therefore,
we get attracted to the
really nice things,
like the fancy kitchen, bathrooms,
as you alluded to beforehand.
The things I say to people,
if you're going to be
living more than ten years in your house,
there's a good chance that
potentially some of the
things that you spent a lot of money on,
those shiny things,
are going to end up in a skip.
Yeah.
Where the fabric,
you ain't going to be changing the walls,
the heating system,
the ventilation system,
potentially ever for the
time you're living in that house.
So I would say that's where
the wise money has got to go to.
And then that's where
sometimes you have to have
that uncomfortable conversation.
But having the wants list, okay,
the things which are nice to have,
which you could maybe down
spec a little bit because
the budget is always the critical point.
Absolutely.
Of course it is.
Yeah, no, there's no question about it.
And I guess that's why the
title for this one is Heating and Energy.
They do go absolutely hand in hand.
Oh, absolutely hand in hand, yes.
Yeah, I mean, energy,
you could then do the
reverse of the heating and
talk about overheating, you know,
and the need for cooling.
And that is something that a
lot of people only think of at the end.
And it's trying to design
out overheating in your home as well.
Yeah.
and putting nice big
overhangs over any south-facing windows,
trying not to have Velux if
you can possibly help it
because then there's no
chance of protecting yourself.
And maybe, you know,
if you've got a veranda or
something like that,
having some nice vines
growing that will shelter
you in the summer months
but allow the sunlight to
come through in the winter.
Simple little things like
that can help you stop
overheating and spending a
lot of your budget on
keeping your house cool.
It's something we do come
across is we've all watched grand designs,
haven't we?
Where they have these sort
of thirty meter kitchens
and it's literally just a
wall of glass south facing.
And I watch and I go,
you just built yourself a greenhouse.
You know,
if you're going to freeze in the summer,
you're going to cook in the summer,
freeze in the winter, cook in the summer.
And I see this again and again.
And I actually have this conversation,
similar thing with the people saying,
look, you know,
you think about this again
at design stage.
If you want the glass, great.
But you think about some mitigation.
Because if you can do any passive means,
as Clarissa said about
having the overhangs,
I've actually got a vine at
the back of my house.
Literally, as you said,
we've got French windows
and so on and so forth.
And in the summertime,
it's beautiful because
you've got this green overhang.
It's lovely.
In the wintertime, it dies off.
You get the sunlight in.
And sometimes it's thinking
about natural means is a
really good way of doing it.
It's a treat.
I agree.
I agree.
Conscious of time.
So I want to move on to if I
throw in words like comfort, style,
saving money, sustainability,
what are the key motivations?
And I reckon this probably
changes depending on their
stage of the project, to be honest.
But what do you and I'm
going to start with you, Rob,
and then come to Clarissa.
When they come to speak to you,
visitors come to speak to you.
What would you say is the key,
the most popular motivation?
I think probably at the
moment is probably cost.
Yeah.
So people are very,
very conscious of two things.
One is obviously budget, you know,
how much money they've got
to spend on what they've got to put in.
And secondly, on the running costs.
I was about to say cost of which bit,
but both.
Absolutely.
And it's always this
question people say to me, well, you know,
how long before I get my money back?
And I'm going, what do you mean?
Well, if I fit a heat pump,
what's my payback?
I said, well, if you fit the gas boiler,
would you be asking the same question?
They go, no.
Then why would you ask on a heat pump?
And I got a little bit
perplexed about that.
But ultimately, running costs are very,
very important, very,
very important to people.
And that's where I say about
spending the money on the fabric,
because that's so, so important.
Because if you spend the
money on the insulation,
the air tightness,
it's going to pay you back
in spades for the rest of
time living in that house.
But I would say probably the
most common conversation is that.
Then probably comfort.
Because people also, you know, again,
as I said before,
people read online that
heat pumps are in a
so-and-so fit heat pump and
the house is cold.
Well,
there's probably good reasons for that.
They say, well, you know,
I want to be comfortable.
I want to make sure I'm warm.
I said, well,
there's no reason why it shouldn't be.
Really?
I said, well, yes.
I said, providing the heat pump,
however it's doing,
whether it's doing through
ventilation or it's doing
through radiators and floor heating,
provided it can provide
enough heat to heat that
property when the house, when it's,
you know, cold outside, you'll be warm.
Simple as that.
I mean, I have an air source heat pump,
had one for,
getting on for nearly four years now.
I have got a,
a two hundred and fifty year
old stone cottage with
verse extensions on it.
And my house is very toasty,
thank you very much.
It all works.
I can, I can reflect that.
We've,
we've had one for about twelve years.
And people go, oh, does it actually heat?
Yes, it does heat the house.
Yes, it's absolutely fine.
I mean, we've split our system.
Our air source heat pump is
just doing our underfloor heating.
And then we've got radiant
fan assisted radiators
upstairs because the
timbers wouldn't take the
weight of underfloor heating.
But we've then also got a
separate air to water heat pump,
a bit like that tall unit up there.
that does just our domestic
hot water so that in the summer months,
the air source heat pump
isn't on outside because
it's not needed for the heating.
So as you alluded to,
there are different systems
available to suit everybody's needs.
It's just finding that right combination.
And would you would you echo that,
that that's the most common
set of questions that you get?
I mean, obviously health as well,
because we're ventilation
specialists as well.
It's the health of the house
and the occupants,
because obviously the more
you seal up a home,
the less fresh air is inside.
So having heat recovery
ventilation allows you to
have an air change every couple of hours.
And it expels all the stale
moisture out the house.
It also dehumidifies it,
which makes it more comfortable,
especially in summer when
you're going to be getting
hotter temperatures,
which when you add humidity
and moisture to it,
that increases the
perception of the temperature.
So having ventilation really
helps on a comfort factor.
And for asthma and allergy sufferers,
it's constantly getting rid
of all the dust.
So you'll find that you're
not dusting as much as well,
maybe once every three or
four weeks rather than once
a week type of thing.
So there's all sorts of benefits that way.
You're not having to open
windows necessarily.
So you're not getting an
ingress of noise from outside.
And barbecue smoke.
Exactly.
But we've worked on city centre projects.
where people say, well, look,
I don't want to open my
windows because of the
traffic noise or traffic fumes.
And people don't realize
that the mechanical
ventilation system have
filters built into them.
So the filters can actually
remove some particulates.
In fact,
there are extra filters you can
actually install,
which will remove even more particulates.
We've worked in projects in
London where actually the
planning permission was
actually early granted
because it had mechanical
ventilation systems built
in it with filtration systems.
So the air quality actually
inside the apartments is
actually better than outside.
And it is a real big plus
point in terms of health.
But likewise as well,
if people are asthmatic,
if you live in a rural situation,
obviously the filters also
help to remove pollen.
So there are actually other
health benefits,
including all these elements,
as a side bonus to the
performance and general
wellbeing of the house.
Which then makes sense of
why you said health is the key one.
That was a curveball for me,
but it makes sense now.
Yeah, I mean, it's also about...
you've got the pollen, you've got the dust,
you've got, you know,
the particulates from outside,
but also you've got carbon dioxide.
When, you know, in a typical room,
if it hasn't got proper ventilation,
within an hour of two
people sleeping in it,
you're starting to
rebreathe the air that
you've just breathed out your lungs.
So that's why after eight hours sleep,
you don't feel rested and
one-on-one isn't making two
your cognitive ability goes
down because you've been
breathing in too much
carbon dioxide through the
night so you have to
ventilate if you're going
to seal up your home but
you really don't want to
lose the heat that you've
just paid for so that's why
heat recovery ventilation
is it's a must and building
rigs are really pushing
pushing it now as the
number one um for
ventilating even even in
renovations as well
I think in essence,
because I'm conscious of time,
we could carry on talking
to you two for ages and ages and ages,
and hopefully we'll get the
opportunity to speak more.
But I know people will
definitely have an
opportunity to speak more
with you both on the
eleventh and twelfth of October.
You are both here.
You're obviously going to be
a mixture on this stand and presenting,
Clarissa.
Yes,
we've got a presentation on the Friday.
I think it's at twelve o'clock.
It is, yeah.
And we'll be on our stand
fifty eight for the duration of the show.
We're also on Saturday going
to be on the Q&A session.
I think heat and energy Q&A session.
Yep.
At twelve thirty.
At twelve thirty.
I was going to test you then
to make sure you knew.
How is my cognitive ability doing now?
Have we got enough oxygen in here?
Hopefully in here we have, yeah.
So that's brilliant.
Yes.
So heat pump ventilation and
heat recovery ventilation
at twelve on the Friday in
the Sustainability Theatre.
Twelve thirty also in the
Sustainability Theatre.
And it is question time for
heat and energy as well.
But able to come and speak to you.
Yes,
they can come and have a look at all
the products on our stand
to see what's going to be
best to fit into their home.
Show us their floor plans
and we can help them on
their sustainability journey.
And it's definitely,
definitely not too early to
come and speak to you
within their project.
Get in there early.
Get the ideas.
Indeed, yes.
Rob, yourself, can you remember?
Well, I'm sorry.
I'm very, very remiss of me.
But I remember the timings.
But yes,
I am doing two presentations on
Renovation House.
So that's good.
Friday and Saturday.
Friday and Saturday.
Quarter past twelve.
Thank you.
Thank you, Chris.
Thank you for the reminder.
But also,
I'm here on hand at the help desk.
right so so so basically I'm
sat there you know at the
help desk and people come
to me for general questions
anything to do with um
building I've got
experience in building full
stop yeah um so from ground
to tiles basically uh but
generally speaking people
normally want to know about
heating uh you know a lot
of time and but also I can
you know I've got knowledge
about about pv systems
solar solar panels and such
like yeah um underfloor
heating the implications of
that so a lot of general
questions come my way um
and I've got plenty of time
there to do that
I think it's safe to say,
as a sort of almost closing
bit with you both, is that you will never,
for want of a better phrase,
mock someone because
they're speaking to you too
early because they definitely won't be.
But you'd be holding it in
if they came to you too
late because you know
they're about to spend an
awful lot more money.
We do sometimes get people
who are almost at first fixed stage,
the sort of the stage where, you know,
they're just about to start
putting plasterboard up and
stuff like that.
And you're like going, oh,
such a shame you weren't
here six months ago.
And the good thing about
this centre is it's not
just a one time visit.
You can keep coming back.
month in,
month out to gain a little bit
more or go on to various... People do.
Some people almost become friends.
Well, we had this in the last episode.
Harvey was saying about how
you love becoming part of
their journey and you get
emotionally attached.
Absolutely, yeah.
No,
it's really nice to see people coming...
I've seen people coming here
really early on in their projects.
And then you think, well,
I've seen you before.
And it's, oh, yeah, now we're doing this.
And then maybe even a year later,
they come back a bit more and a bit more.
And it's a very good way
because it says that trying
to take it all in one go,
you're going to swamp.
Yes,
coming multiple times does cement the
knowledge.
Sorry, that was a really bad pun,
wasn't it?
We'll let it slide.
We'll let it slide.
But the point being as well,
final comment before I let you go,
is that come and have those
conversations with you,
even if it's too early to
really put them as cemented plans,
is that it's starting to
get the little sort of like
tidbits together,
get it as part of the
conversations with the
experts in those early stages, etc.,
come back again and you will
help them build to how much
info and how much product
they've got at the right times.
Is that a fair assumption?
Well,
thank you both so much for joining us.
Don't go anywhere, viewers,
because what we're about to
do is we're going to change
over the hot seats.
That's why we've got the
handheld mics this time,
because I'm about to bring
out Katie and Nick from
NSBRC and we're actually
going to have a look at the
highlights of the show
that's coming up in two and a half weeks.
Can you believe that?
Time flies.
I know, doesn't it?
Looking forward to it.
It does.
So bear with us.
We're just going to do the switch over.
We'll be right back.
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Welcome back.
hot seats have changed uh
welcome katie and of course
uh nick now make sure I get
this right because I know
it's changed since we
started this content
marketing manager for kj so
correct yep that's not
james uh and nick one is
now the sustainability
manager got it in one idea
very much which was a
slight tweak what did that
happen whilst we were doing
it it was changed days
before episode one yeah so
it was a it was a sort of a
bit of a new announcement
at the time but yeah
It's been ages now.
It's been four weeks.
I know.
It's old news.
You're settled now.
You're settled.
Katie,
two and a half weeks away from the
eleventh and twelfth of October,
the big self-build and renovation show.
So close.
Isn't it just?
I mean,
it must be getting so busy for you
guys now.
Yeah, it's all go behind the scenes,
definitely, but we're so excited.
I think the shows always do
come around so quickly, to be honest.
Yeah, it's really exciting for us.
Is it three a year?
Yes, it's three a year, yeah.
So we do a big show in January.
We do our Festival of
Sustainable Homes in May,
and this is another classic
edition of the NSBRC show.
So it's the all-time show, isn't it?
It is, yeah, yeah.
And the weather's kind of
taken that turn now, truly, hasn't it?
For me, this is my first true...
Classic Edition, as we're calling it.
That's a good point, yeah.
Because I was lucky enough
to come to the January show
prior to working here.
I was kind of prepping for
my job interview,
coming in and meeting the team.
So I got to actually come to
that one as a guest.
But then we were straight on
to the Festival of Sustainable Homes,
which was a little bit different.
You know,
we kind of gave it a little bit
of a twist.
So this is my first Classic
Edition National
Self-Building Renovation Show.
So I'm really looking forward to it.
Nervous?
nah it's gonna be great it's
the right answer yeah
exactly I mean it is I'm
looking forward to being
here with you on day one of
course we're broadcasting
which is a sort of a suck
it and see that we're doing
I think to some extent but
we're going to be in
amongst and bring in the
excitement of the day to
everyone whilst they've
still got the ability to go
actually I'm going to come
along to that because it's
free and there's loads of
free parking despite being
just off junction
it's just a no-brainer and
they can come to one or
both days yeah absolutely
that yeah even if you book
tickets for the friday and
we do recommend pre-booking
but you can always use the
tickets for saturday as
well so it's really flexible very easy
Because if you come on the
day and you haven't booked tickets,
there is a fee for that.
That's it.
It's twelve pounds per person on the door.
That's why it is really
important to pre-book your tickets.
Absolutely.
It is a no brainer.
There's no question about it.
And as I say, lots of free parking.
Now we have a timetable of events.
This is what I love is that
this whole place.
I mean,
I just I'm in love with this place.
It's just such a cool setup
from the renovation house behind us.
to each of the exhibits and
various other houses and
features and everything
else but one of the big big
stories of these live shows
is that you've got a sequence of
seminars training
presentations all sorts of
things like that I'll go to
you nick to start with um
yeah you you have this
timetable that you even
created a little timetable
for me to put on I sure did
yeah so throughout the day
so um as you said on your
average day you can come
and visit all of our trade
stands all of our
educational exhibits um and
you can absolutely do that
throughout the show but the
timetable of seminars and
different talks that we have going on
We've been in our two theaters.
So right behind us today is
our build it theater.
So all the way back down that end.
And that's kind of our
bigger of the two venues, if it were,
our main stage.
And then our second stage is
the sustainability theater,
which is kind of down this end,
which is as you come in is on your left.
Yeah,
and it's kind of really a timetable
throughout both days that
you can dip in and out of,
talks that kind of vary
between half an hour, forty-five minutes,
that are focused on exactly
what you want to hear about,
whether that's your whole
kind of self-build journey,
which is focused in the build-up theatre,
or the sustainability theatre, which has
a bit of a, a bit of a mixture.
And I'm, yeah, I'm only, you know,
I'm not going to, where am I?
Wrong, wrong camera.
Where am I going?
There I am.
You can definitely read that on camera.
It's no good.
You can't see it,
but suffice to say that
this is just giving you an
insight that it's a
detailed timetable with everything on.
But the reason why I've done
that is I love this.
At the bottom, Katie,
it says your appointment.
So you can look through and go, oh, yep,
I want to go to that one, that one,
that one, that one.
Just note them down.
Yeah,
that's something we've actually added
in recent years because
obviously there's so much going on.
And in both theatres,
we do have talks running
throughout the day.
So they start at ten a.m.
So you want to arrive nice and promptly,
get parked up, grab a coffee.
Sort of get familiar with
the location and then, yeah,
sit down and join the talk
you want to attend.
But, you know,
you need to keep track of
where you need to be in Wangs.
Although we do seminars,
we do other things like guided tours,
one to one expert appointments.
So you do need to sort of
keep a tab of where you need to be.
So, yeah,
we just have a little space there
where you can note things down.
It makes sense.
And that's why I like the
fact with what you said
there that you come on the
Friday and then you suddenly go, actually,
I've still got things I want to do.
And it's fine.
You can come on the Saturday as well.
I think that's really, really good.
I know we're putting the
timetable on the screen and
we're waving it around.
I think we've all got our own copies.
If people who are watching
this now do want to have a
look at the timetable on
their own laptops,
it is on our show page on the website.
We've got a couple of
different links there.
We do like to try and put it
up a couple of weeks later.
before the show.
At this point, it's firmed up,
so we know who's going to
be speaking and when.
So we've got a little
description of the company
and what sort of talk
they're going to be offering.
And then you can just have a
look in advance and plan your day.
That's probably the best way of doing it.
It is.
I mean,
I just put the link there on screen
for the show,
and I've just removed it
because I'm about to do it
in the chat section.
So wherever you're watching...
you should now have popping
to you the link that you
can press to find out all
about the show and book those tickets,
etc.
So everything that link you see on screen,
everything is there.
So click on that link and
you'll be able to find it.
Get your tickets.
Now,
the first one we're looking at is the
the build it theatre.
Yeah.
That one that way behind that,
behind the renovation and
behind the wall there is
the build it centre and this one
repeats Friday, Saturday.
Yes, it's pretty much identical.
I think there's one company who's doing,
there's two different
companies doing the same
talk across the two days.
But other than that, it's exactly the same,
basically.
So in other words,
if you're over in one of
those and you're going,
I really wanted to see that.
Yeah, it's on the next day.
That's where your
Clashminder comes in handy, right?
You know,
I wanted to go to these two talks
at the same time.
Well, actually,
if it's in the Build It Theatre,
you'll be able to catch
that talk or an equivalent talk.
on the other day.
Highlights of the day, in your opinion?
I think, even though it's so hard to pick,
they're all incredibly valuable.
I mean, ultimately,
it does depend on the individual.
So what project are you doing?
You're going to be looking
at very different talks if
you're doing a full-on self-build,
or if you're perhaps doing
a barn conversion or a retrofit,
you are going to have
different priorities.
And not just the project you're doing,
but also the stage you're at.
You might be interested in
different things.
But I think something that I
was quite keen to talk
about on here was
highlighting the talks in
the Build It Theatre.
So the ones that are the
same on both the Friday and Saturday,
these are the self-build fundamentals.
So they, to be honest, are applicable,
really, if you're doing...
a self-build or a renovation.
It doesn't mean you have to
be doing a self-build per se,
but the key part is that
they are absolutely fundamental.
So things like financing and
funding we'll be covering first thing.
So this is going to be
really relevant to anyone
attending the show.
You need to have your budget established.
It's the first part of your journey.
If you don't have that,
you're not going to be able
to build upon it.
Chaos will ensue.
Not for the first time, I'm sure,
when there's this much to see.
So that's eleven o'clock
financing and funding.
Eleven forty five finding
land and appraising a plot.
Oh, yes.
Which I love from where we
had Tom McSherry and Mark
Dudes on episode two.
So I didn't realise,
but just over there is
plots that are available.
Yeah, plot search.
Yeah, so plot search.
So just, I mean,
from where we're situated here,
where you kind of come into
the centre and say, right,
down what we call an expert alley.
If you stop just short of that,
you'll find the build store
stand just here, which part of that has,
well,
you might find Tom Cherry in there
if you're lucky,
and you probably will on show day.
if you want to have a chat
with him but also what
you'll find in there is
plot search as a little
section of that where you
can see live plots that are
available now and I'm
pretty sure Tom said last
on the last episode that
they already have planning
permission they are
suitable plots to build on
so yeah you kind of you've
got to make a decision
which one's right for you
which is why eleven forty
five finding land and
appraising the plot go and
see that then go to there yes
Renovation course, just a taster session,
because I think, yeah,
forty five minutes is not
going to be enough for the full of that,
but get them in the mood.
And that's our man, Rob,
who was just here.
Yeah, absolutely.
Planning.
Mark Dudes, of course,
was with us last time.
So that's vital.
And we were hearing, I mean, again,
we were talking about it
with the heating and the
energy side is that a
little bit earlier in the planning.
Exactly.
Yeah.
So it's important to pick up on that.
Design principles at one thirty.
That would be an interesting
one because I guess that's quite emotive,
although I think we
possibly got a mistake on
some of these times here.
So bear with us on that.
Yeah, the order's correct.
The order's correct.
Sorry, my bad.
I've got the times wrong.
That was me.
No, I think, to be honest,
it's because we don't
release the timetable until
quite close to the event
because we are just bumming things up.
It's a top secret.
Yeah, that's it.
So if anyone wants to find
out all the times and just
make sure that they are
completely correct,
then... So in principle,
find out about this.
I'll stop mentioning the times.
Battle of the Building Systems.
Yeah, that's a really popular one.
What's that?
Yeah.
So Battle of the Building Systems,
it's essentially a panel discussion.
So we have an expert who is, well,
multiple experts who are
representing a building system.
So think timber frame, SIPs,
so structural insulated panels, ICF,
so insulated concrete formwork.
Traditional masonry kind of
brickwork will be in there as well,
I think.
Yeah.
So just all these different
types of building systems
that you could choose from.
But you might want to weigh
up the pros and cons.
It could be you're thinking
about what's right for, you know,
where I'm living and what my budget is.
So I suppose if you talk to
someone one on one,
you're going to hear just
the pros and cons for one system.
But if you're talking to you,
if you're listening to a
seminar that's got multiple.
different panelists on
you're going to be able to
make an independent
judgment I think a bit more
easily that way I like that
it makes me think of robot
wars for some reason that's
a throwback just showed me
age there didn't I um but
yeah just having those guys
so they're going to be
together trying to argue
that their way yeah it's
good fun young people have
a vested interest in in the
different building systems
and they'll be kind of
talking about the pros and cons of those,
but I think some of those
will be what's useful for
you and your plot.
But some of it, it depends.
I'm going to put my
sustainability manager hat
on for a moment.
And actually,
there's a really good
conversation there to have
around kind of the embodied
carbon versus the operational carbon.
So it's how much carbon are
you using in the moment
when you're building?
actually what's the life of
the building going to do in
terms of your carbon costs.
And they will speak to that
and there will be benefits
that are across the board
on there that are really different.
Which one's your priority?
I like the sound of that.
Then we've got building controls.
Yes.
Yes.
I think that's one I'm
looking after on my build it bit.
So I'm just going to have to reread this.
I knew I was going to trip
you up at some point
because you've got so many
of them to remember.
I don't know how you do it.
Quite a lot.
We have brought our notes
with us just to be sure.
So it's talking about
building control procedures, essentially.
So just making sure you're
ticking all the boxes.
doing everything correctly
and safely following
procedures and keeping
costs down as well.
Of course, yeah, yeah, yeah.
So not just from the planning,
but it's then being done in
the right way.
Yeah, I've got you.
And then VAT reclaim,
that was interesting.
I think we vaguely touched
on that with Tom McSherry last episode,
where there's a whole load
of things that actually...
you don't have to pay the
VAT on if you're doing it
through the right
renovation self-build site.
Yeah, that's it.
So if you're doing a renovation,
then you are exempt from paying the VAT.
So that is something to bear in mind.
And obviously, if you are doing a,
I say obviously, I suppose perhaps it's
It's more obvious to us.
But if you're doing a self-build,
then you are exempt from paying that,
or you can claim it back, basically.
The person to speak to about
that is Andrew Jones himself.
He does a really good talk,
and that will be taking
place in the Build It Theatre.
I'm not going to commit to a time,
I'm afraid.
No, that's fine.
it kind of bookends that
fundamentals journey with
finance and finance right
so it's setting your budget
at the start but don't
forget your kind of vat
reclaim because some of it
will have to be a reclaim
um so some of it you will
have to to pay for up front
and then reclaim and it's
making sure that you know
at the start of the process
actually how do you have to
do that the right way to
not miss the boat on being
able to reclaim some of
that well I'm hoping that
we'll get a huge difference
in your budget andrew jones
I know he watches this and
and quite often uh comments
and and what have you and
so hopefully uh in fact
he's liked this video so hi
andrew if you're still
watching uh hopefully we'll
get him on at some point
because I think we'll try
and go and catch him yeah
when we're live
broadcasting I think and
and I appreciate now more
after episode two why
that's a conversation that
has to be had because I
didn't know anything like
that that there was
you know we don't need to be
painted which we probably
will so you've got to
reclaim it back again etc
yeah so that's important to
know okay so that's the
build it theater both days
um then sustainability
we've got split into into
two ground source heat pumps that we
were touching on a moment ago.
We were definitely talking
about air source heat pumps.
Sorry.
I couldn't hear fully from
across the room.
I think we underestimated the distance.
We thought we'd be able to
hear everything.
We would have to be away.
So I couldn't hear all of
that conversation,
but there was certainly an
air source heat pump
conversation going on.
But ground source heat pumps are...
It's an interesting one
because you will get an
increased level of efficiency with those,
but they have more specific
requirements in terms of your location.
So whether you have enough
space to actually make that work,
to actually be able to get
the solar gain energy from the ground,
you don't have a bigger
property or a bigger budget
or able to build a borehole.
They may not be for you,
but if they are for you,
then they're going to give
you a better kind of
efficiency and savings over
their lifetime.
Yeah, of course.
So that's worth catching up
on that project costings.
I mean,
that seems like a minefield for me.
And Tom was again explaining
about how it is possible to
bring those budgets
together in the early stages,
plus understand that they
might shift a little bit.
But for me,
that's probably the scariest
part for me about how I
derive these project costs.
I think really that's
exactly what this show is for.
All the experts here,
I think if you went into
any kind of project sort of
very overconfident,
unless you've done many,
many self-builds and you just...
very au fait with the
process I think it's so
normal to be quite
uncertain yeah and be a bit
nervous and unsure but
that's exactly what our
experts are here for so
they're here to answer all
of your questions and in
fact yeah and the key point
that I keep picking up from
these other episodes is it
is I'm going to use the
wrong word here easier to
do than than you think
Easy is not the right word, I know.
But it's more possible than you think.
A hundred percent.
And I've been picking up
more and more and more.
And it's like, okay,
it's not as out of reach and impossible.
I mean,
even down to simple ones is that I
always thought that it was
my friends that were in the
trade or one of the trades.
And then they had friends in
the other trade and they
kind of all clubbed together.
And it's like, no,
it can be a fully managed trade.
one yeah there's there's a
whole mixture of how hands
on how hands up hands on or
hands off you want to be
you know you you could be
you know maybe you've
learned to be a bricklayer
and you want to be
literally doing that and
that's fine but you don't
have to be doing that you
know you could be
overseeing that um but you
could even be be working
with a project manager who
is going to be doing that
for you and running
decisions past you in terms
of how you want your house
or your home to end up
being so there's a real
sliding scale of how that can work
So this one shows that how, you know,
understand how to arrive at
those project costs to get
that budget right.
It's not as impossible as you think.
These people are experts at it.
Sustainable and low energy
systems followed by heat
pump ventilation and heat
recovery ventilation.
Real.
So as you might think in the
sustainability theatre,
there's quite a lot that we
could group together here.
I did spot that.
Yeah, it's a running theme.
It doesn't mean that every
single talk in there is all
about sustainability,
but there's certainly a
running theme through here.
But we talk about
sustainable and low energy
systems and the heat pump
ventilation and heat
recovery ventilation.
And we've also got on the same day,
passive house question time,
which is an opportunity for
Q&A and water and wastewater treatment.
So all of those
have ways of making your
home more efficient and or
doing your bit for the
environment in very
different ways yeah and you
need all those things all
those solutions pulling in
the same direction and
that's why we hear from all
of our exhibitors that
actually have all of these
conversations and learn
about all of these things
before you actually I mean
either physically or
metaphorically put a spade
in the ground you know you
need to make these
decisions up front and it's
thinking about how one
thing will impact the other
because some of these uh
low energy systems that we
talk about may be quite
insulation focused,
but actually that moves us
on to the ventilation side, actually,
which Clarissa has been talking about.
And the more you increase
your insulation and the
performance of the property,
the more you're going to
create a need for ventilation.
But actually do that in a
mindful way rather than, oh,
it's fine because I've got
holes around my windows
that haven't been sealed up.
No, actually,
let's seal all of that up and
get some good air tightness
and have some strategic ventilation
It kind of almost felt that
there was this to get the
right solution for you is
about it's like this.
If you move that,
that then that comes down
and it is very much about
and it suddenly hits at the
right solution.
And that's why the experts come in.
What's this?
So what is Passive House?
What is Passive House?
OK,
so Passive House is almost the gold
standard.
of of the performance of a
house um so this would be
if a property is going to
have a certain level of air
tightness which um you'll
see the testing for this
which is you may or may not
have seen on on the tv or
anywhere that you're kind
of doing your research for
for a self-built project or
renovation that you would
you would kind of close all
the windows and doors you
would have one door open
and you would have a system
that blows air through there to test
how much of that air is
being retained and how much is escaping.
And it is this gold standard
of air tightness and the
actual performance of the property.
And if you can achieve that,
then you absolutely reduce
your bills and your need
for using energy.
So before you even think
about moving to a renewable energy source,
you're reducing the demand for energy.
So it's where I think Rob
mentioned about fabric first approach,
which is something that we
champion quite a lot here, which will,
you know,
there will be different schools
of thought and different
scenarios that work for everyone.
But it's very much leaning
into that fabric first
approach where you are
getting the house
performing as well as
possible before you're worrying about,
well,
what is actually the energy that I'm
bringing in?
Yeah.
I think in the last session,
I heard Harvey say
designing out your energy consumption.
And I thought that's a
really good way of terming it, actually.
And it is exactly that.
It's just the gold standard of doing that.
And some people will go for
that because you will then
get assessed on it and you
get to have that little
Passive House badge,
which you can wear as a badge of honour.
A lot of people build sort
of to near Passive House standards,
though.
So you don't necessarily
have to do the Passive
House certification.
It's not all or nothing.
But yeah,
it's just about achieving the
most airtight property you can,
essentially.
That's what I think what we preach in.
Yes.
It's like a challenge for them, though,
isn't it?
I like that.
Well, some of us like their stats, right?
Oh, absolutely.
There's certainly a pool of people,
and I think I slide neatly within that.
Yeah, I can imagine.
I see all the stats of how
your house is performing,
and that's one for you,
if that's the case.
Benchmark, what's that?
So Benchmark is a brand new
exclusive offering from the NSBRC.
So it's essentially a membership with us.
You can sign up by looking at our website,
basically,
and there's an email address
that you just need to contact.
But what it includes...
So basically you get to join
various events with us,
whether that's online or
live at the centre.
You have a personal shopping experience,
a dedicated contact at the
NSVRC who can basically
advise what sort of courses
would be right for you and
what kind of events you should attend.
You can have four ninety
minute consultations with experts.
So someone like Rob, for instance,
who we've just heard from.
And that also includes
guided tours as well,
if that's something that's
relevant to you.
So the renovation house you
can see behind us can have
a guided tour around there
with an expert and one to one as well.
um and then you also have
other perks like a vip area
that you can go to in the
shows along with other
benchmark members it's not
too shabby at the shows so
yeah I could sort of just
go on yeah the vip
benchmark area is going to
be nice you know so that's
a presentation that's been
done to to launch that yeah
essentially yeah so it's um
you'll find it on the
timetable and that'll be
harvey and christina who
sort of they're the ones
really who who would
be talking to our visitors
about that in great detail
and kind of and just really
giving you an overall sort
of an overarching view
sorry of what benchmark
will include in a bit more
detail so um there's also
things like getting thirty
percent of courses uh
that's a big one I just
need to make sure I do do say that one
But there's just so many benefits to it.
It's if you're a highly
motivated and engaged self-builder,
essentially,
and you just want to do a
little bit extra.
So not just coming to the
odd show or workshop.
If you were interested in
doing multiple courses,
it's a really good way to
sort of attain a saving on that.
Yeah.
um because obviously if
you're booking multiple
courses if you could get a
discount on that you might
as well and I'm liking the
vip area as well I must be
honest oh yeah for sure
yeah there's something
where you know we have
offered vip areas at the
shows previously which was
a separate a separate
payment on its own yeah and
that was almost a bit of a
pilot for then launching
this which is a whole
scheme that you that you
can join um and benchmark
really it just offers
although we very much pride
ourselves on you can come
and get all this
information for free you
can come and visit
six days a week for free and
get lots of great guidance
and advice at the centre.
Actually,
if you just want that extra gold
standard where you know
you're going to be able to
pre-book your one-to-ones,
you're going to get
discount on courses that
you know you're probably
going to use anyway.
It's two hundred and forty
nine pounds for a two year membership,
which if you think about
the costs of your project,
if you're serious about
your project and you're early on,
it really is a drop in the
ocean for the amount that
you're going to save and
the great advice you're
going to get for this project.
and it's per project as
opposed to per person so
you know if you and your
partner have an active
project um you know if you
think about splitting that
cost into it I think it's
quite worthwhile really one
of you doesn't need to wait
outside the vip area
kitchens I think that's
fairly self-explanatory isn't it
Well,
I think Rob alluded to don't get hung
up on the finishes,
but there will be a point
when that stuff matters.
Absolutely.
And I think where do I spend
a lot of my time in my
house and what makes me
feel good about it?
Yeah,
you want to have a nice finish when
you get there.
Don't prioritize it over the
fabric and the performance of the house.
But there's a time to then
think about those things.
think we have so many
visitors at different
points of their project
though so some people I see
at the shows have been here
multiple times and I think
oh my gosh yeah this is the
fifth time I think I've
seen you guys attending and
it's fantastic it's lovely
to actually just go up to
someone and say oh hi like
how's it going did the
planning permission go okay
I mean we got it all sorted
um so it's really lovely
actually some people
attending this show just coming up um
you know,
they will be here for the first time,
and they might be a bit
confused as to where to start, perhaps,
you know,
just because there is simply so
many talks to choose from,
and everything could be relevant,
that you might want to hone
in on certain areas, really,
if you are at the beginning
or partway through,
maybe your focus is on planning,
but perhaps in the future,
we'll be on finishes.
And it's nice to have that
dream and that vision as
well as the practical stuff.
It all goes together.
But as we were talking with Clarissa,
is that even if you're not
at the stage of actually
making the decision of
exactly what you have in here,
you do want to start having
those conversations and
this was a prime example
that says you might not be
deciding exactly which one
but it's probably already
the right time to be having
an impact on the plans and
whatever else so yeah get
those conversations going
I'm not sure who to aim
this one to I remember
being said about the like
you've even got the barcode
system yep what was that
again so every stand within
the trade village which we
can see behind us um but
truthfully it's any exhibit
in the center we have
barcodes on and it
essentially means we can
operate a paperless system
so we're not giving you
tons and tons of leaflets
you know that you're
probably gonna lose or just
you know misplace somewhere
you know you're able to
have a barcode scanner set
up so that will be yours
for the duration of your
visit and any companies that have
services offerings that
you're interested in
honestly could be to do
with anything whether it's
a product or a service it's
not necessarily a physical
item that you're thinking
yes I want to buy that so
I'll scan it you know as if
you're in Tesco but it's
really just to say I am
interested and I would like
you to get in touch with me
there's up to six different
barcodes on each exhibition
stand so if you wanted
someone to phone you email
you send you some samples a brochure it
It states it on the stand,
so you just go for the one you're after,
really.
So you're not suddenly
throwing your life away by
just zapping the one barcode.
And you're not just getting
loads of phone calls that
you didn't actually ask for
if you haven't asked for it.
Yeah, I like it.
Okay, that's really cool.
I thought that was a good time to do it.
Water and wastewater
treatment is the last one
on the first day,
the Friday in the Sustainability Theatre.
And as you said,
that goes back to sustainability.
Yes, it does.
Yeah.
So there will be a few
different kind of facets to that, I guess,
where you're thinking about, okay,
are you capturing rainwater
and then using that perhaps
for grey water in your
house where maybe you're
flushing your toilets and
things like that.
So again,
you're saving the water you're using.
But it may also be about how
are you treating your
wastewater to make sure
that it's environmentally
friendly and isn't, you know,
if you've got the wrong
sort of nutrients in there,
which are quite likely with wastewater,
then actually not so great
for the environment.
So how do you treat that?
And I do like what you just said there,
using like grey water for
flushing toilets.
That's something we really
should be doing more.
I still kind of sit there going,
I cannot believe we flush
our toilets with drinking water.
When you put it that way, you kind of go,
seems a little bit wasteful, right?
A hundred percent.
So I love that.
And that, yeah,
that whole discussion about
with this sort of
self-build is that you're
in control of what you want
your house to do.
Yes, that's it.
I like that.
I really do.
You can tell that I'm doing these shows,
but you're selling to me the whole time.
Yeah, that's it.
I'm going to have self-build.
Yeah, I am.
Episode five.
Will we be seeing you at the October show?
It's going to be.
I know we will.
So last one on to Saturday.
We start off back in
Sustainability Theatre,
solar and battery storage.
Yes.
So I know this is one we've
touched on already a little bit.
Clarissa's talked a little bit about,
I think she gave a great
example of adding a battery
to your solar.
It's something that you can
do at a later stage.
So it's one of those things that is,
one of those considered
added extras in a way so
yes it's for the higher
budget projects to add a
battery to your solar pv
system if you're gonna
actually you don't want to
do the whole the whole hog
straight away you can get a
system set up where you've
got solar panels and you're
harvesting energy from
sunlight um but if you have
just that system
without a battery,
what you're then going to
be doing is use it or lose
it in the moment with the energy.
So either you use it in your
system or you can sell it
back to the grid and you can get,
you know,
you can make some money from that,
but it's obviously at a
reduced price compared to
what the grid would sell to
you because they're not
doing it out of the
goodness of their heart.
But yeah, yeah, that's it.
But then on top of that, if you were then
at the time or at a later
date to be able to add a battery.
What you can then do is you
can store energy to be able
to use it at the time you want it.
Or if you do have surplus,
if you're running at a
point where you actually
after a day or a week,
you do have surplus energy,
you can sell it back to the grid.
But you can get some really
smart tariffs as well that
work in unison with that,
where actually you can buy
energy at the cheapest time
and sell it back at the
most expensive time and you
can get it all working in unison.
So there's some cool bits of
tech out there.
I did like the comment that Clarissa said,
is that this could be
something that you live in
it for a little while to
find out what your needs are first.
But that's the first one.
I'm conscious of the time
because we've gone against
your rule that you set for me completely,
by the way.
Guidelines.
Guidelines.
Yeah.
We're miles over it.
Loft conversions.
I think that's a cool one.
Fairly self-explanatory as well.
Jump in if there's something specific.
Well, it's self-explanatory,
but actually this is Telebeam.
It's an interesting one
where it's quite a unique
solution where actually
it's a telescopic beam.
So I think it's a really interesting talk.
If people are into gadgets
and doing things a bit of a different way,
go and check this out
because it's going to be
something that's going to
be an intriguing different
way to do a loft conversion
that might not be the way
you thought about it before.
And I think the less we say about that,
the better because that's
not the mystery hanging in the air.
That has got me intrigued.
Mechanical ventilation with
heat recovery and VHR.
Yeah.
Yes.
It's very much Clarissa's world.
Exactly.
Innovative construction methods.
I made sure that I
pronounced that slowly then.
Yeah, this talk is a little bit.
So we talked a small amount
about insulation,
but I think this session is
going to be talking a bit
more about insulation between floors.
um and it'd be very easy to
to not do that you know to
think well I don't mind my
heat going between my
downstairs and my upstairs
so it's an interesting talk
to think about a different
thought process on that
rather than just thinking
about outer walls so again
I'll leave the mystery
hanging out there to go
find out more um then we
got a question time heat
and energy yeah it's always
very popular is it yeah
That makes sense.
Benchmark back again on that day,
which makes sense that it's
going to be back there.
I love this one.
Home cinema.
That's my favourite, I think.
Yeah,
it's probably one of the more sexy
talks to put in.
But we probably shouldn't be
considering that too early in the plan.
As with kitchens,
the home cinema bit is part
of the aspirational journey
and you need a carrot at
the end of the stick as well.
So you're thinking about why
am I doing this project and
what is my life going to be
like afterwards?
We do like to get the
balance right here where we
actually practice what we
preach and give a weighted
schedule that does put fabric first.
But there are some of these
little bits that are going
to be intriguing and
they're going to make your
life fun at the end of it.
going back to our customer
promises I think I might
have mentioned this in the
last episode we did but we
are here to inform inspire
and offer impartial advice
so it's not just about
obtaining the cold hard
facts and working out what
is correct and what isn't
correct it you know you're
allowed to have fun here
too it's not all just about
you know stats and
statistics um obviously a
lot of it is but
You know,
we do have a really cool home
cinema room and it's at the
back of the Potten House.
It is a little bit tucked away.
But yeah, it's really, really cool.
I definitely recommend
people just have a look.
That's the thing.
If you're designing something from scratch,
absolutely.
I agree that we've got to be
considering these things
that is going to help
reduce the costs and
increase sustainability, et cetera,
et cetera, et cetera.
but I do want to enjoy this
place and I'm now designing it,
not buying it,
but how someone else designed it.
And I think you would.
So I think that's a great one to go into.
I'm not sure where this is
typo because obviously it's
provisional timetable,
but I've got roof cladding systems twice.
Yeah, no, that's not correct.
So roof-cladding systems and
then exterior shading
solutions we've got.
So exterior shading solutions as well,
that comes back a little bit.
Like we talked with the ventilation,
it's almost where you are
finding that balance where
perhaps you are increasing
the performance of one
thing and you therefore
need to balance that out a little bit.
So this is where almost
we're thinking about if you
are getting a house that
actually retains heat and
is better insulated,
but you've got positions in
the home where you're getting solar gain,
the right day when you're
cold you want the solar
game when you're warm
perhaps your house is going
to get overheated so do you
think about actually having
some strategically placed
shading um to be able to
help your home not overheat
on those summer days that
we do get sometimes
Yeah, no, that makes sense.
I did just realise, by the way,
I've still got the Clarissa
and Rob's name.
It's not Clarissa and Rob, obviously,
it's Katie.
I forgot to change that part on it.
My bad.
In fact, I'll do it this way,
is that I'll put it up as a banner.
There we go,
is we got the right people there.
Thank you.
I think that covers the time.
I mean, if anything,
even me sort of like not at a stage,
I'm there going,
that sounds really interesting.
That sounds really cool.
Whether you're thinking
about embarking on a project,
whether you started it,
whether you're even a long way down,
there is something there for everybody.
Absolutely.
Yeah.
And even if you've been before,
you'll hear something new
or you'll hear something
you didn't remember last time.
Yeah, absolutely.
Anything else that I haven't
covered on it?
on the show.
I guess the only thing I would add,
and you might have a different thought,
is the fact that we're
going to be broadcasting live.
on the day of on the friday
yeah so throughout the day
we're going to be we're
going to be here doing
doing I guess the grand
finale of season one I'm
going to call it yeah
building renovation live
yeah because it's built
into this show isn't it
yeah yeah yeah that's it so
that's going to be exciting
where are we we're we're
going to be set up in the
what you call that yeah the
dale house I'm not sure if
it's quite in shot or not
but behind us in the middle
of the trade village is going to be our
our little center of operations, I think,
for us.
But my studio is going to be
in there and you're going
to be throwing a variety of people there.
Plus,
these will be roaming around with
with a camera on a gimbal
and we'll be sort of
getting in amongst it and
we'll be broadcasting all day.
And I can't wait to feel the
buzz of the day.
Yeah, it's brilliant.
And it's going to be great.
Yeah, the two of us and Tom,
who's doing good work behind the screens,
we're going to be kind of
roaming about some of the
day and also having some
chats in the Dale House.
And you notice there's two mics now,
so there's no excuse.
Two mics.
So, yeah, I'll be joining.
You will.
But I think you'll have a
bit of a different role on the day,
won't you, Peter?
Yes.
So I'm going to be on the booking desk.
So one thing we haven't
actually mentioned during
this episode that I think
probably is quite important.
So if you have been to any
of these talks and you want
to follow up with that
presenter and just find out
a little bit more information,
perhaps something that's
specific to what you're doing.
You can book a one to one
appointment with them afterwards.
So if you come up to the booking desk,
it'll be myself and my
colleague Claire will be
staffing that desk throughout the day,
throughout both days.
We can find an appointment
time that works for you.
And when the expert is also
free and you can just have
a twenty minute free
consultation with them.
It's a really good system.
Obviously, if you're a benchmark member,
you can pre-book these in advance,
have as many as you want.
But if you are attending the show,
I'm sure we can absolutely
find some appointment times
that will work for you.
Yeah,
it's so great that it's then a
two-way conversation and it's,
you've had that
presentation with that
person and maybe there's
been a bit of Q&A time within there,
but you can go and have a
twenty minute chat with
that expert about your specific project.
And I just think that's such
a great asset.
No, it makes complete sense.
I think that brings this
episode to a conclusion.
It leaves us to be excited about the show.
Friday the eleventh,
Saturday the twelfth of October.
Get your tickets online.
I've already put the link in
the chat of wherever you're watching it,
whether it's on YouTube,
Facebook or LinkedIn.
The NSBLC page is full of those.
It's on the bottom of the
screen here as well.
down there there we go it's
down here um get yourself
booked on uh and I would
suggest you come to the
friday because you might
find you want to come to
the saturday as well yes
that's good advice yeah
nothing worse than come
just the saturday and go oh
I could have had a second
day yeah and if you if you
see us come and say hi
because you know you you
could jump on the mic if
you like we might want to
hear what what your visit's
been like or if you don't
want to do that just have a
chat with us anyway
Yeah,
I definitely want to know because
we've heard it in every
episode now is that you
guys really connect
emotionally with the people
on their journeys.
And I can imagine that.
And so I'm looking forward
to hopefully having a few
of those discussions.
Yeah,
if anyone's feeling brave and wants
to have a chat with us to
camera about their project
and their experience here,
we would love to hear that
because it's great hearing
from the experts.
It really is.
Hearing from the businesses
would be cool too.
No, I look forward to it.
Well, from all of us here,
thank you very much for joining us.
It's been a pleasure.
Hopefully we got, again,
a vibrant place here and
you may well hear the
people in the background.
And again,
I make no apologies for that
because that's what this
place is all about.
It's a buzzing happening place.
Absolutely, yeah.
And it's lunchtime, right?
And it's a busy conference you've got here,
isn't it, as well?
right so we'll leave you
with it thank you very much
for joining us we'll be
back for episode four as
you say the climax for
season one of uh the self
build and renovation live
got it by nsbrc you can
tell I've been talking too
much I couldn't remember it
all then um and we'll be
back in two weeks on friday
uh live from the show but
from us here now we'll see
you then cheers