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Hips fiasco

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It seems that in spite of warm words from the Government in recent months on the "successful and smooth" introduction of Home Information Packs news from the ground is somewhat different. Last week's article by my colleague Michael Willoughby in Building, and just as importantly the attendant reader reaction, gives the profession perspective, whilst an excellent piece in this month's Which magazine gives the consumer viewpoint. Both are pretty dreadful.

CLG chaos

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Just picked up news reported in today's Telgraph (no link) that there's a fresh delay in the rollout of Energy Performance Certificates "amid concerns that there are too few qualified assessors and to avoid the type of controversy that dogged the introduction of Home Information Packs". Apparently "The Department for Communities and Local Government is to give a six-month grace period to landlords whose property is already on the market when EPCs are introduced next month". Surprise surprise. Good job we delayed our Sustainability Now show.

Virtual event

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Here's a new thing I'm working on - an virtual show called Sustainability Now. It will take place on 15 and 16 April and works a bit like an online conference. More information here. Interested in any thoughts on the content of the show, which will be programmed similarly to a live event, with seminars, audio, debates, surgeries etc. I'll be putting up the programme I'm working on later in the week. You can register for it for free here.

Letter from Brussels

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EUSEW and So

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Back from a very wet Brussels, dodging in and out of extraordinarily named buildings (Berlaymont, Breydel, Charlemagne) and each one down a different rainswept traffic-ridden street from a central roundabout, it was clear that the EU's Sustainable Energy Week would take more cracking than just one day. The requirements to show passports, remove outwear and pass through scanners whenever entering a building slowed the whole thing down somewhat and made me pine (extraordinarily) for the NEC. Getting into the enormous Berlaymont, where the Commissioners commission for a press briefing, involved registration of passport numbers and took about half an hour.

Property predictions

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Today's Property Week offers a crystal ball on 2008. I've been thinking the sector would be completely obsessed with the credit crunch so could potentially lose interest in sustainability, but the experts writing in the magazine suggest otherwise. Four main predictions are made (the articles are subscriber only, I'm afraid):

Energy Performance Confusion and Chaos

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It must be the sub zero temperatures, howling winds and talk of economic depression but this year is already feeling like it will be a glass half full one. Some articles I'm receiving from experts on the upcoming introduction of Energy Performance Certificates for the Building Sustainability channel deepen the gloom. Roger Watts offers a perspective on the history and the future of EPCs in an article that appears in the Building Sustainability channel today. It makes for rather disturbing reading.