Science makes weather for new homes - 10th February 2023

This is a science centre in England - 'Energy House Labs'. The centre can make different weather. It tests the weather on new houses.

The government's changing rules about building. In 2025, homes will need to use less energy.

Will Swan's the director.

Will Swan: "When you try and understand, you know, how a house is energy efficient, you normally have to wait for the weather, so here we bring the weather to the research problem. We can compress a two year experiment into sometimes a matter of weeks."

Inside, they can change the weather. It can be -20°C or +40°C. They can make wind and snow too.

The test houses look normal. But nobody's living there. They're full of science equipment and new technology. These help to make the houses 'green'. It means their use of energy isn't high.

Will Swan: "What we're experimenting on is everything. So doors, windows, insulation, fabric, right the way down to the heating and cooling systems within the homes. The experiments we're doing here now with our partners are really to try and understand how we deliver those future net zero homes in the UK."

One expert, Tom Cox, is very excited about these houses. They can try out modern technology there.

Tom Cox: "We've got the panel heating, which is a point source in the room, and we've got a very unique research product up here which is an infra-red coving."

For Cox, there's one special thing - the different products can work together.

Tom Cox: "So one of the key technologies that we're trialling on this house is almost like a building management system for residential buildings. You connect all of that technology into a single interface. It's almost like the Alexa of the the home energy system. And that can be automated as much as the occupant wants."

Energy prices are rising. Climate change is getting worse. These Labs can help to build green homes for the future.