Zero Ambitions Podcast

In the midst of a weirdly warm October for this part of the work, we're talking about thermal comfort in building design with Huda Elsherif and Andy Simmonds about a project they've been collaborating on in Tanzania . While the lessons we can learn from it might not be immediately obvious, there are plenty of them there to be had as our climate grows warmer. In terms of building design it's alread...

Lloyd Alter introduced us to Passive House Accelerator earlier this year and it turns out that we're doing some quite similar work, promoting high-performance building, sharing innovation, and elevating thought leadership. Instead of starting a blood feud, we decided to invite Zack Semke onto the podcast to talk about what they're up to and see what we can learn from them. As it turns out, they're...

We've a slightly different episode for you this week. Our guest is Ellora Coupe who we think has a big part to play in the retrofit space without performing one of its traditional roles. Ellora is the founder of Her Own Space , a platform that provides a women-only space to share knowledge, insight, support, and help in all things to do with renovation. It's an incredibly engaged community that ha...

It was about time we had someone from the Irish Green Building Council (IGBC) join us on the podcast. So Jeff invited Marion Jammet, the IGBC's Head of Policy and Advocacy , to join us to talk though a recent white paper they published in conjunction with the Institute of International and European Affairs . The paper is titled: Reviewing the Co-benefits of Energy Efficiency in an Irish context an...

We often talk about the notion of selling high performance building to people but we rarely seem to talk with people who actually deal with the customers. In an effort to fill this gap we were joined by Andy Mitchell , MD at Green Building Store , a long-established retailer of all the things a high-performance building might require, and a passive house specialist. We start with ventilation befor...

More heat-related chat this week. We're with Lisa Treseder of Kensa Utilities joined us. She’s the string-puller behind Kensa’s Heat the Streets project the success of which has garnered national coverage because of its innovation and its success so far ( which is now up for an award ). Heat the Streets is a pioneering project in which Kensa sought to provide a Cornish village, that wasn’t on the...

'EnerPHit need not be any more expensive than retrofit': those are the words that we put into the mouth of this week's guest Mel Reynolds. He stood by them, even if they weren't his own, but advisedly. It's not necessarily easy, but it can be done, and it can be scaled up. Mel took us through his experience in working on high-performance buildings, learning passive house principles, undertaking hi...

Returning champion, Dave Pearson of Star Refrigeration joins us to talk about the viability of heat networks. There loads we can learn from Dave's experience, so keep a notepad handy. Rather than talk in the abstract, we discussed the conditions that make them viable, why anyone should consider one, and how we can make them happen. Notes from the show Dave Pearson on LinkedIn The Star Refrigeratio...

Lauding an alternative viewpoint to always aiming for the loftiest standards, in this PH+ Revisited Lloyd is championing Toby Cambray's Insulate Britain-inspired article, from February 2022: Let's get decarbonisation done . It's an article about taking a differently-considered approach to domestic decarbonisation strategy and one that Lloyd has referenced frequently because of its refreshingly pra...

Joined by returning champion, Rufus Grantham , we're talking about using community and place-based approaches to catalysing large-scale retrofit. To this end he's set up a new consultancy Living Places and he'll tell you all about it this week. We're not pretending it's actually easy, but if you create the opportunity the finance will follow, and setting up the opportunity is a lot harder than fin...

Welcome home Duncan Smith ! And, we're pleased to introduce Richard Orr, Head of Asset and Regeneration at River Clyde Homes . We've been alluding to the things that Duncan is up in his new role as Head of Energy & Sustainability, so we were delighted when he said he'd come back to tell us all about his new life in Greenock. The work they're doing should be as significant for private developer...

Kit Knowles is a sustainability consultant whose pioneering practice, Ecospheric, is forging its own path, concerned with making the greatest impact, getting things done, and big backer of research so they can learn how to do better. This week’s episode can be summarised as being about “the inherent conservation of energy principles associated with a building” i.e. design before fabric, and doing...

Today, we have a new show on the feed. Long-time friend and contributor to the Zero Ambitions Universe, Lloyd Alter is taking the reins to look back at some of the fine work that Jeff has commissioned over the years, with a mind to making it more accessible to a wider audience. So, in parallel with the main show, Lloyd will be curating a tour through some of the best of Passive House Plus, intervi...

Air quality matters, that's the subject for this week in our conversation with Simon Jones and it's all about ventilation. In this instance, Air Quality Matters is Simon's new consultancy offering outcome-focused ventilation strategy. Simon is a professional with nearly 20 years of experience within the housing, construction, and building services sector. He's an Associate Member of both The Insti...

This week we are spreading the word about the Buildings Action Coalition (BAC) , a coalition of professionals from all areas of the built environment, from all over the planet, brought together to support a UN-backed global target for 'near-zero emissions and resilient buildings to become the new normal by 2030'. Mindful of this 2030 decline, the BAC is bringing professionals together to "turbocha...

This week we're joined by Gillian Campbell , the Communications and Public Affairs Lead at Existing Homes Alliance Scotland , a professional with a wealth of experience in the housing sector. Gillian has been involved in some really interesting work around influencing government policy around their retrofit strategy. In particular, their research has revealed insights that are relevant to anyone i...

This week we met Peter Warm and Sally Godber , a father and daughter team well known in low energy building for their work at their Warm consultancy . Although Peter may now be retured they've both been instrumental in Warm, consultancy in volved in testing and certification of buildings, as well as training for professionals.  We hadn't intended to focus on passive house, again, thinking that we...

This week Beth Williams joined us to talk about structural engineering and sustainability. She's an associate at Build Collective , (one of Jeff's favourites), and a professional who is long-steeped in green building practice. While there were some rash accusations of 'nepo baby' status, it seems that economic casualty seems fairer.  Trained as an architect Beth went where the work was after the g...

This week we have a transatlantic expert's perspective on the state of sustainable building in Ireland and the UK. Friend of the show, Lloyd’s Alter joined us after a research trip and drinking holiday to the UK. We thought it would be interesting to ask him to tell us about what learned on his travels and he offered us hiss thoughts on wood, the inspiring projects he visited, the people he met, c...

With the world waking up to the need to rapidly decarbonise buildings, quick-fire, quality education and training tailored to the industry's needs is essential. But doesn't training in how to fly drones for budding building pathologists sound too much like fun? This week we spoke to Lis O'Brien and Benny McDonagh of TUS about an exciting new platform, DASBE (the Digital Academy for the Sustainable...

People off the telly don't tend to know the first thing about sustainability, let alone possess a properly anoraky understanding of the subject, but Charlie Luxton is different. Jeff and Alex spoke to Charlie about his approach to sustainability, how to communicate about the benefits of sustainability, asking more questions to our clients, and about the state of architectural education, among othe...

This week, Jeff, Alex and Dan are joined by Dr. Peter Rickaby , a man who should need little introduction to those who know the sector well, and to the listeners of our podcast, he's been on twice before. To those less familiar with him, he's an expert in the sector, who's devoted a career to improving energy efficiency in the built environment in the UK with a particular interest in retrofit. Thi...

This week we're joined by Dr. Oliver Kinnane and Dr. Richard O'Hegarty of University College Dublin to discuss their recently published paper: A whole life carbon analysis of the Irish residential sector - past, present and future . In some ways it's quite a technical episode, delving into calculation methodology, but one tempered by lots of meandering diversions. The pair are academics who both o...

This week Alex and Dan were joined by Emma Elston (Sustainability Associate) and Amandeep Singh Kalra (Associate Director) to talk about all things MMC (modern methods of construction). The pair are working on some pioneering projects that are utilising MMC in order to deliver value throughout the supply chain, including a construction pattern book that could be of massive value to everyone involv...

For a change, it's an episode that mainly concerns sustainability for non-residential building design. Friend of the show, James Woodall joined us to talk about his experiences in sustainable architecture in all its complexity, and how to help clients do better work by challenging briefs, asking difficult questions, and then help clients to answer those questions. We also covered the untapped pote...