One of the most diverse monitoring and feedback programmes of new build dwellings in the UK has been launched by the Good Homes Alliance and its partners. The project is sponsored by the Energy Savings Trust and Communities and Local Government.

Feedback from the project will help inform the country’s sustainable housing agenda and determine which build systems and approaches offer the best mechanisms to reduce carbon emissions and improve the sustainability of new homes.

The GHA and academic partners Leeds Metropolitan University, UCL and Oxford Brookes University aim to measure the energy performance of five dwellings on four member developments over a 12 to 18 month period, including monitoring at point of completion and during occupation.

The results will be published in autumn 2011 and provide the house building industry with the information needed to ensure that developments meet their design standards and continue to perform as intended once occupied. Recent research has revealed a gap of 50-100% between design intent and actual performance.

The homes are in the Joseph Rowntree Housing Trust’s Temple Avenue in York, Crest Nicholson BioRegional, Quintain’s One Brighton, Ecos Homes’ Old Apple Store in Somerset and Gentoo’s Racecourse Passiv Haus in Sunderland.

The programme will examine the fabric performance of the dwellings which will be measured before occupation to compare actual performance with design expectation. Data will also be collected on the homes’ energy and water use, internal temperature, air quality conditions and the performance of Low and Zero Carbon Technologies.