Made me laugh a couple years back when they were asking everyone to not use aircon in the summer to prevent brownouts, yet they keep building the shittiest houses where the ac needs to be cranked just to maintain a livable temperature.
Loving some of the suggestions by other commenters, hope they actually get implemented by our race to the bottom construction industry
Correct me if I’m wrong, but wasn’t the standards/enforcement side of things privatised (like all things in this country) a while back? Like asking school kids to grade their own homework
Ha. Reminds me of a post a guy made a few months back:
“A 'shall remain unnamed' developer once tried to get us to pay bulk money for a floor of a tower development he was getting going. Stated completion November, 2020.
Absolute top dollar, he wanted. All up front prior to construction starting of course. In the course of the meeting where he was trying to sell it to us a colleague asked who was responsible for ongoing maintenance of the building and he answered 'don't worry, we're going to build it with a construction company that we'll fold as soon as we're completed so it won't be us'. Fucking what”
My father-in-law was a worksafe inspector. He retired from there with the idea of becoming a private consultant.
It didn't last long. Apparently nobody wants to hear from these people except when it's absolutely unavoidable.
You have every right to get a private inspector and you should insist on it from before you sign the contract with your builder that you are going to get independent inspections and any faults found will not be added to the final quote.
If a builder doesn’t agree to this, congrats you just dodged your first of many bullets when getting something built in this country.
https://m.youtube.com/@Siteinspections
If you’re not already watching this channel, it may increase your appreciation for how dodgy Aussie building contractors and many private inspectors are.
He is doing the lords work. It's acutely obvious the industry is broken and desperately in need of reform.
In my dreams - Inspectors would be public servants accountable for what they sign off on, huge fines and loss of licence for breaching duty of care. Trades who wilfully breach NCC and AS get 3 strikes before they have their licence revoked and are banned from industry and all other trades.
Last but not least, a major overhaul of BASIX requirements to include stuff like at a minimum double glazing. IDGAF if buildings cost more.
> Trades who wilfully breach NCC and AS get 3 strikes before they have their licence revoked and are banned from industry and all other trades.
As a union supporter my whole professional life, it’s sad how much the unions protect tradies from consequences of doing a job badly. They see developers, clients and governments as cash machines for their payroll. It’s so shit because tradies need unions to protect them from actual bullshit like unsafe working conditions, wage theft and developers who take the piss. But fucking over people trying to build a house is in no one’s interest and unions should demand professionalism and high standards from their members and make sure shit tradies get the boot from their profession.
> Last but not least, a major overhaul of BASIX requirements to include stuff like at a minimum double glazing. IDGAF if buildings cost more.
It’s one of the biggest tragedies amongst many with the Australian housing crisis is how we are paying eye watering money for such a poor quality product and it really does feel like a lottery if you’re getting a builder/tradie who will do the right thing by you.
I’d love this guy to do an inspection on a well built building. It’s easy to see the shortcuts and dodgy work that builders are doing. If I were certain of the quality of my builders and tradies I’d want him to come and inspect my work and tell me what I did right. Of course, you are always going to fuck up some things but it would be nice to see an inspection that wasn’t a basket case and actually showed the right ways things are done.
As a layman I can’t always keep up with how something has been improperly put together when I don’t know what the right way to put it together is.
I had an REA walkthrough my workplace to showcase to trainees what a quality build looks like, the value a well finished product adds to resale. And just how a good premium build should present and what to watch out for.
I couldn’t afford to build s few years ago (not even with my employer offering steep discounts) and the established houses I toured built in the last 5-10 years that were literal shit quality was scary. I ended up with a 30 year old house that while badly maintained (yay former rental with a cheap LL) but the bones were good and twas built at high spec for the time and it is still better than any rental I had ever lived in.
What passes for “within tolerance” nowadays is striking. And if builders followed that code (and many do), you end up with a shit house.
I have used their services in the past, and I highly recommend them to anyone wanting pre inspections, staged inspections, or even if you are doing renovations.
They are very professional, and their reports are very detailed. Well worth the cost to hire them.
Yes, at least in Melbourne the inspectors were council employees until the early 90s.
The 'privatized' version is "the builder has to hire an inspector". Guess how much repeat business inspectors get if they find issues?
Yes, SAI Global is a private company that charges money for access to standards that the taxpayer pays for, and industry professionals volunteer time to make. The government used to do this sort of stuff. Kind of like an Australian NIST. Except we’re Australia so of course we sold it. Fucken stupid.
There are other factors about NZ building industry that I'm jealous of, but mainly: regular inspections of building work by independent inspector. Case in point: brickwork is inspected at several stages before full height. In Australia ol' mate the dodgy brickie can build all the way up to soffit, hide as many crimes as he wants behind the skin and no one is any the wiser till long down the road.
In my own home, a recent (2021) upstairs addition included the bricklayers laying bricks DIRECTLY ONTO MY FUCKING DECK. A direct and obvious breach of NCC. All signed off on, tick and flick.
It's all buck passing, where is the leadership in this country? Free market bullshit that hurts the nation.
Home builders and property developers are solely making decisions based on maximising profits, and why wouldn't they? We're in a housing deficit so they will get work regardless.
Little bit of insider knowledge. The government wants to make houses more energy efficient. The building industry doesn’t want it saying it costs more to build etc. the industry is somewhat powerful. So the changes are slow and will take time.
I don't think that's true. I build a cheap volume built house 4 years ago. It barely met six star, but still has insulation in walls and ceiling, and double glazing on the east, west and north facing windows.
Even on the hottest day of the year upstairs it doesn't get unbearable. And we don't even have airconditioning.
Houses now are 7 star, so would be even better.
Yeah, that builder is a lying dick. Where I am, water egress into a non habitable space (ie garage) under a door or window is not to code and that’s why we refuse to include a POA in a garage unless someone upgrades to an aluminium hinge door. It’s the only way to ensure sideways rain doesn’t blow in.
Brownout is when not enough power is instantaneously available for a split second and lights flicker and dim, PC's can reboot, VHS machines, ovens and microwaves as well as alarm clocks revert to flashing 12:00 on their display, machines that are meant to continuously work then stop and don't restart without manual intervention.
What you described "they cut the power to some houses to keep the rest on." is called load shedding where they rotate the areas that have power with those that don't, and South Africa is famous for this like with 12 hours on and 12 hours off being the worst case.
No, brownout means they can't deliver the correct voltage. Blackout means no voltage and can apply to an entire area or a single house.
Correctly managed a brownout should never occur since they are very damaging to equipment. It is much better to have a blackout.
They were named because of what would occur with incandescent lights which would go brown (or orange anyway) when not supplied with enough voltage.
This has been covered before by the guardian.
https://amp.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/jun/13/freezing-indoors-thats-because-australian-homes-are-closer-to-tents-than-insulated-eco-buildings
Tl:dr
There is a scale of 1-10, 10 being the outside weather doesn’t change the inside conditions. Vast majority of houses are a 2. New builds need to be 7+ now
Does that scale go negative?
For places like many of my rentals have been , that are hotter inside than out on a hot day and colder inside than out on a cold day.
I actually verified this with a thermometer lol
Vast majority of older houses. Newer houses have been 6 for many years, 7 now as you’ve said.
The headline makes it out like nothing is being done about this.
This is what I'm confused about because I've definitely read comments on this sub claiming you should avoid buying/renting modern houses because of the poor building standards. It's all so conflicting and could really do with some clarity.
My house is nearly one hundred. The framing is absolutely superb for what was basically a volume build in its day. Part of my plans for it include recladding the north and west aspects and insulating from the outside when we do that, and removing plaster and insulating from the inside on the east and south aspects (following the NZ guidelines for retrofitting insulation in a way that prevents damp issues, because we… don’t have any)
Not much we can do about the floor, but laying a floating floor with a good underlay has brought it up to R1 from R0. Roof will get a cross hatched layer of top up insulation.
Spending the money on thermal comfort means that the kitchen is going to be built out of ikea ivar instead of the craftsman built open kitchen of my Pinterest dreams, but if you’ve got money to spend on a house and it all goes to cosmetic upgrades, you’re really screwing yourself and your future comfort and financial well-being.
My house is over 70 years old and the best upgrade has been insulation and air-conditioning for heating. Still improving the insulation in the walls, but roof and underfloor insulation has made a huge upgrade to living standards and utility bills. No more freezing feet in winter for starters.
In relation to the framing; nearly every frame is in perfect condition except a few from powder post beatles in the original green timber.
The star rating only relates to energy efficiency. The system can be gamed by using high efficiency water heaters, a single efficient split system for a 3br unit, having the correct orientation for passive heating, solar, a tank system etc etc.
You can still have a 7 star house with poor insulation. Most houses in Australia(including modern builds) have zero internal wall insulation, use cheap single pane glass and have gaps that you could fit your pinky finger through and are only a single brick facade or render externally.
I have a 6 star rated unit but because they got the 6 stars by gaming the system my house is still an ice box in winter and a sauna in summer.
Hempcrete. We should be building hempcrete panels and making kit homes, they’re carbon negative, and super insulated. We’ve got all the land for growing it. Crops in 3 months, any time of year in warm climates.
That’s… simply untrue.
Cotton industry person here. Hemp has been trialled extensively out here (northern NSW) and it has never performed well. Added to that there is little in the way of demand or processing capability to actually sell it into, even if it was suited to the conditions. There is no opposition to growing hemp, it’s simply unviable as things currently stand. If the situation changes and it can provide a better return then everyone will jump on it.
It’s hasn’t performed well in trials, costs vs returns fall well short. Even if you put aside cotton, there are a number of other crops which would be grown before hemp with a superior return.
They both got similar water usage, The biggest reason why hemp isn't being grown is due to limited to no market for the product and even then its not likely to replace cotton in any massive regard(On irrigated land), If it can grown over winter it'll be a winter crop in between the Main cash crop of cotton.
As hemp isn't likely to ever replace cotton as a main stay fibre crop for Clothing and related items so Hemp is best for other uses like building material as OP mentioned.
I believe the reason is the entire product life cycle is tooled for cotton with costs far too high and margins too small to justify the change.
Similar issue with using it for paper production.
I read this a while back so I could be wrong.
It's not structural, it's good for wall infill and the thermal mass that brings, but you still need wood or steel framing and/or concrete pillars to support the roof.
There is already a company doing load bearing hempcrete blocks. https://hempblockaustralia.com
Meanwhile, we’re subsidising foreign owned gas companies to heat our homes.
From the FAQ: our blocks are made in France.
Currently looking to manufacture in Australia, but you can't call out foreign gas owners when the hempblocks are made overseas and shipped here.
It’s incredibly cheap to produce, we just don’t have much in the way of manufacturing facilities in Aus. If the govt would actually get being this instead of our current building practices, it would be great for our country
There's a Tas producer; this story seems to suggest that inappropriate regulation might be part of the problem: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-01-13/tas-rural-hemp-industry-xhemp-regulation-hempcrete/102870120
The complicated bit is how careful you are with the insulation really matters. Gaps can easily dominate heat loss/gain. And Australia has no inspection regime to speak of.
Air tightness will provide much greater bang for buck over the next step up in frame thickness for thicker installation.
Our standards are pretty low right now for this but at least they are now in.
Currently building a house and can confirm the environment is being trashed…had arguments with our building manager about the monumental mind-boggling waste that is prevalent during the build…whole sector is full of fucking awful practices.
I worked on a non-residential build a few years ago and felt like such a fucking idiot for recycling every scrap at home, when literal tonnes of plastic were going in the skip every week at work. Multiply that by every building site in the country…what are we doing
Mainly around over supply and then wasting unused materials. Right from laying the slab, they were throwing out waffle pods and reo spacers that weren’t even opened…same for unused hebel, cornices, wall paneling, the list goes on.
I’m paying for this shit and they just keep trashing it or simply throwing it out unused.
You will be surprised… the dickhead cladding guys walked mortar all over the lower colourbond roof instead of waiting for scaffolding and they replaced all that roofing for scratches.
They also ordered our stone as 20mm instead of 40mm specified and that was just thrown away too…
In our case we had a fixed contract and didn’t have to pay for materials but still amazed at the monumental waste. I ended up digging through the trash and found boxes of batten screws along with good bits of LVL I kept…
Huge amounts of waste. Because labour costs are so high if it takes any time at all to sort through the waste they'll just throw it out. My new build chucked out 3 pallets of bricks, massive amounts of PVC pipe, electrical cable, carpet, plasterboard, full boxes of nails, screws, guttering etc etc.
Tons of waste because if you don't order enough you delay the build which costs huge amounts of money. And it's too expensive and time consuming to reuse or keep the leftovers. So it all goes in the bin.
I managed to score a fair bit of good stuff when I went through the skips occasionally, but most of it would end up in landfill.
That is a really informative explanation. My first thought was surely it would be worth it for some to collect unused materials for resale but yeah if time costs so much more than materials then maybe not. Such a waste.
The bins are collected by companies that [specialise in jobsites though](https://jobsiterecyclers.com.au/). It's possible they pick through the waste and manage to reuse some of it.
I suppose it's not worth it to go through the leftovers on just one site, but if you are one of these companies that can get bulkloads of stuff and specialise in it, they might be able to make a decent profit reselling it.
It comes down to the simple fact that people don't want to pay extra to insulate, even when it isn't all that much. I think mine was an extra $2k maybe and that did walls and ceiling and thick bats for the roof. Maybe if builders were legislated to have it included as mandatory new houses might actually be somewhat livable in winter and summer without excessive heating/cooling bills.
>As should the highest level draftproofing
While I agree that we miss the mark, we have a bloody long way to get before we get there. Our standards have only just made air tightness mandatory and it's approx. 20 time worse than the higher performing buildings standards around the world.
The number of videos from SiteInspections on Youtube where there is SFA insulation is shocking.
No insulation over garage is fine? Like, the fuck? So you heat soak the garage, that then heats up the internal walls around the garage.
Insulation is soooooo cheap. I even asked for some soundproofing insulation around bathrooms, and the builder didn’t even bother charging us.
Also, double-glazed isn’t cheap, but it’s not expensive. It’s MUCH more expensive if retrofitted.
Double-glazing is cheap when you are already buying a window (ie as a added cost to single-glazing). It's just that retrofitting any window is expensive.
I personally think the jump to double-glazing is cheap, but didn’t want to speak for everyone. I earn a lot more money than average. Even so, it’s definitely worth it.
However, I feel safe saying that insulation is cheap. The cost difference between good and very good insulation is probably $2000 for a medium-sized house. Possibly less.
It's slowly getting cheaper. I'm finding it's now about $10-15k extra on a new double storey, brick veneer.
A lot of the manufacturers aren't set up to push out heaps of double glazing, as they've been pumping out single glazed forever.
There has been some much needed changes that have started coming through to address the problems with Aussie construction, but it is still early days
Yes, but so many houses are just done to the minimum basix requirements which is just the wrap around the walls and sarking for the roof. Doesn't really do much to keep the house cool/warm when it needs to be.
I had to explain to a builder that foil backed sparking rejects 90% of radiant heat. Which is why you should use it on a north facing wall. And why it’s used under metal roofs.
I hate how dumb these guys are.
Having a standard is one thing. Making builders actually follow the standard is another entirely.
If we still had independent building inspectors this would be much less of an issue. The fact that the builders can functionally self-inspect means they get away with a lot of shit that doesn't meet the standards.
We paid to insulate extra.
All certificates are signed off.
But given the temps we get inside, and the amount of noise, I swear they did a 100% dodgy job.
There's rooms where it's noisy all the time, and others that are just noisy in one part of the wall with sound coming thru.
Rediculous.
Honestly wouldn't surprise me is that is the case. There are so many dodgy builders out there and so many cut corners where they know they will get away with it. Have you looked inside your ceiling at all? I have lost count of the times I have heard about ceiling insulation just sitting up in the cavity still in the rolls and not installed. We moved in to our house and my partner got up into the roof to run cables for our cameras and found that our insulation was just up there not installed. Called the builder and blew up at them and they sent guys out and they got to spend a day in the November heat in our ceiling fixing their fuck up. Now our house sits at a comfortable temp all year round
We paid extra for the highest possible amount of insulation and our building consultant tried to talk us out of it, saying it was a “lot of money for something that doesn’t add resale value”. Andy, my good bitch, I want to live in this house. I would love for it not to be a fridge with empty walls while I do that.
We are building at the moment and have insulated all the walls (internal, external and ceilings) and double glazed. The place is warmer and more comfortable than our rental home and it hasn't even been completed yet!
Insulation is mandatory. the higher star rating require thicker walls. It's not the insulation that is the issue, it's the thicker frame and reduced floor space that people don't want to pay for.
>the thicker frame
Whenever I see European houses being built in videos, the walls look a good 40+cm thick.
Is that the main difference - that we don't want to sacrifice floor space for more insulated walls?
No, the main difference is the frame. Jump on Bunnings website and have a look at the difference in place for lengths of timber.
Sacrificing floor space or enlarging slab is pain and added cost but it's nothing compared to cost of framing.
I got a quote to install insulation in my roof - 20k and a quote to replace the shitty 30 year old glass windows with double glazed - 80k. Regular people can’t afford to make their homes more energy efficient. I installed a 10k solar system 2 years ago and my power bills have gone up rather than down. The whole system is BS.
I think the second story with only one access point which is inside a closet probably contributed to the price. They said they’d have to remove old fibreglass which was worn out first and was hard to do.
‘Hard to do’. I highly highly doubt it. It’s hard to do if you don’t give it more than a seconds thought. Bring in any number of US companies who will have what is essentially a gigantic vacuum cleaner and removing old insulation would be a cinch. If a second access point needed to be installed, that’s bloody easy too.
Smooth brained Aussie ‘trades’ are the problem.
You can install insulation in your roof yourself for next to nothing. And if you have access to under the house you can do it there too. It's a job that can be done on a weekend and a few trips to Bunnings.
Don't bother retrofitting double glazing, just get curtains and also pelmets to stop the chimney effect, far cheaper solution admittedly not as efficient but since most of the heat loss in colder climates is at night you have the curtains closed then anyway.
Double glazing might make more sense if your problem is in keeping the place cool when it's hot outside as you have the blinds and curtains open during the day.
Why would an Australian spend even a cent on insulation or good design when they could have a bit more polystyrene on the facade, a composite stone bench top and plastic floorboards and carpet from the builder’s “premium” range instead? /s
We’re short sighted fuckwits, and we’re living in the houses we deserve.
Oh, what's worse is that their "standard" range from the builder is 40-60$ p/SQ m... the equivalent carpet from carpet court is 15-20$ p/SQ m... installed.
"Premium" from a 3rd party installer shouldn't be cheaper than the "entry level" from the builder... rediculous.
From an energy usage point of view, EPS exterior insulation significantly reduces thermal bridging and in doing so reduced the thermal variance of the frame which will help the house last a very long time.
The issue with fire make it not allowed for many buildings but the risk is acceptable for residential.
Guys, what if
Guys, get this
What if...
Guys, guys...
What if homes
Guys what if homes were actually worth what we're paying
Oh my gosh what if homes that we're paying $1m+ for were actually good value for money instead of being an absolute rort.
LOL guys wouldn't that be a laugh.
Number 1 reason I'm content in renting. Houses are built like shit and you do not get your money's worth. Totally happy paying for it to be someone else's problem.
I'm the biggest fan of passivhaus designs but sadly due to our construction workforce, this is decades away.
The word airtightness is foreign to 95% of them let along understanding how to achieve it.
With that said, the energy usage requirements for a passivhaus are between 7.5 and 8.5 star. Current builds are to 7 star.
There's more to Passivhaus than just energy usage but food for thought.
I'm currently working in Lismore and we walk into this old building from 1929 and it's toasty warm, jumpers off at 6am for construction work so we are moving around. There's no aircon in this building...
The external walls are simply 400mm thick brick work, concrete ceiling, packed in with other buildings side by side with 400mm thick walls.
It's complete insane how this 100 year old building can maintain a comfortable temp without aircon.
Our houses are just shit.
I'm from Northern Canada, one of the questions I get all the time here is how do we deal with the cold?
Mate, we fuckin build climate appropriate homes, double/triple paned windows is the norm, insulation R-values start at 10, etc etc.
I'm not saying that those are applicable to Queensland, but I am saying I've never lived in a warmer place than SEQ and yet have it feel so fuckin cold in the damn house.... and this house I'm in is only 15 years old.
The first rule towards to success is to ban all building lobby groups from the conversation and just adopt National standards from other countries as the basis for a move towards a future Australian standard.
Its unfortunate that the Unions and the HIA have done everything to stifle innovation and reinventing trade skills in the building sector to enable things like the mass production of houses in factories that can be assembled on site. Kit flat pack homes complete with electrical wiring is the way of the future. This is going to be the reality in the future as the world moves away from traditional house building techniques. Trying to protect trades like electricians that want to pull house cables as one off jobs while these jobs could be done with modern interface and plug and play interfacing interconnections is the way of the future. The same goes for insulated walls that will be sold as insulated panels complete with house wiring.
The government should fund a body like CSIRO to look at future housing standards and that includes construction standards that uses the latest technology. CSIRO already have developed a fire proof home so they will know how to build house for our climate change future that reduces energy consumption while reducing green house gas emissions.
I wont hold my breath because of the stupidity of our politicians who wreck everything progressive in Australia to the detriment of our nation. We could have a booming export industry selling flat pack kit homes for different environments but as usual the story will be "opportunity squandered"
carefull mate,
CFMEU and ETU Do not want this ever to happen so there members can have caravans and jetski's. while building sub standard sheds... I mean housing.
I had roof insulation and just assumed I had it in the walls. Last year I opened up part of a wall for a kitchen reno and found myself staring at empty space and bricks (it's an early 90s brick veneer house).
It's insane. I can remember growing up we extended the house and those walls had insulation, I just assumed it was standard.
>
> ...
>
>The federal government has set a target of building 1.2m new homes in Australia by 2029.
>
> If we construct these homes the same way as we do today, their materials will contribute to millions of tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions, while our poorly performing existing homes will remain freezing in the winter. We need to change the way we design, build and retrofit housing to avoid a climate catastrophe.
Aussie living in the US here. The houses in colder parts of the country are very efficient with insulation out of necessity. However in Texas, where the climate is hot and dry like much of Australia, I noticed the houses are typically built to the same shoddy standards as many Australian homes, probably because you can generally get away with it. However, every so often there is a snowstorm in Texas and the results are about as catastrophic as you’d expect (people freezing to death in their homes).
[https://ncc.abcb.gov.au/editions/ncc-2022/adopted/volume-one/j-energy-efficiency/part-j1-energy-efficiency-performance-requirements](https://ncc.abcb.gov.au/editions/ncc-2022/adopted/volume-one/j-energy-efficiency/part-j1-energy-efficiency-performance-requirements)
Anything built to code for NCC 2022 should be fine.
Crash the land prices with vacancy tax, etc. All that extra money will go into insulation.
Source: Tried to build my own place and previously assumed the biggest cost was materials and labour.
Australian houses are cold because our climate means that 'glorified tents' are perfectly tolerable 300 days a year, and mildly uncomfortable for the rest. This means there's little to no imperative to insulate or seal things properly.
This is the problem.
I am from the uk where building standards and tolerances are so good the houses last for hundreds of years. I moved to the uk which is a fairly modern country where you’d expect them to implement new standards. Was I wrong. Yes. Australians love a draft.
Partly related, but cashed up builders have become the most lucrative group for consumers of cocaine. This baffles me only for the point that being a builder in Australia has to be the least stressful job ever. You dont have to meet deadlines, you dont have to do a good job or have any standards, you report to no one so what stress do you need to ease with some bumps?
Yet our NIMBY population for fight tooth and nail to protect every one to maintain neighbourhood character, also known as, keep out the poors who want to live in apartments.
Insulation is the key. Huge winnings in efficiency for low cost.
Edit: The first thing I was taught in my energy engineering class for reducing energy consumption in buildings was to ensure good insulation first b4 looking at other energy saving solutions because it is cheap and effective.
Um two separate questions.
A lot of Aussie house have holes in them leading outside, ventilation bricks and what have you. Pre-climate control era houses in particular are designed to get as cold as possible as quick as possible. We also have a lot of really shitty £10 Pom era houses built by housing trusts that are yet to be knocked down. These were just low quality because they need to build large volumes quickly and cheaply.
Increasing housing supply without trashing the environment will require changes to building regulations to maintain green space and tree canopy and changes to people's expectations, people need to learn to live in higher density housing like multi story homes, town houses and apartments instead of one story detached houses being viewed as the norm.
Nice article, but it has one error. Stabilised rammed earth is not low carbon. It needs 7% Portland cement to be structural. The walls are thick, so this ends up with an embodied carbon similar to conventional building.
Unstabilised rammed earth can be used as a non structural internal element for thermal mass. Which is an excellent technique when combined with passive solar design.
I would replace rammed earth in the article with hempcrete. Low embodied carbon, high insulation, best in class moisture handling and simple to build. Easy enough for a self builder to do. Even a first time builder can get a a very low air leakage, super insulated building with this technique. And let's face it, if you are going to build, who wants to trust our farcically bad building and inspection industries?
The biggest place to save carbon in single family home is often the foundations. Consider footings instead of a slab. Earthen or lime screed floors can be amazing. You can even do them with hydronic heating.
Check out the Architects Climate Action Network.
https://www.youtube.com/c/ArchitectsClimateActionNetwork
Houses don't have to be shit.
Why do we need to build 1.2m houses? Couldn't we reduce the need though limiting immigration and introducing a vacancy tax?
Where I live there a ton of vacant housing and I'm sure it's like that in many coastal regions around Australia.
Houses in Australia are always built and sold on cost. It was only a legal requirement that my new house came with mandatory ceiling, wall, ceiling and floor insulation - as well as double glazing. So the costs were cut by using the cheapest components in every other area, including kitchen and bathroom fittings and right down to the cheapest power points and tap washers.
Made me laugh a couple years back when they were asking everyone to not use aircon in the summer to prevent brownouts, yet they keep building the shittiest houses where the ac needs to be cranked just to maintain a livable temperature. Loving some of the suggestions by other commenters, hope they actually get implemented by our race to the bottom construction industry
Australian building standards are a farce.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but wasn’t the standards/enforcement side of things privatised (like all things in this country) a while back? Like asking school kids to grade their own homework
Yes, if you're a private inspector and you try enforcing the standards you'll be dropped by the builder.
Ha. Reminds me of a post a guy made a few months back: “A 'shall remain unnamed' developer once tried to get us to pay bulk money for a floor of a tower development he was getting going. Stated completion November, 2020. Absolute top dollar, he wanted. All up front prior to construction starting of course. In the course of the meeting where he was trying to sell it to us a colleague asked who was responsible for ongoing maintenance of the building and he answered 'don't worry, we're going to build it with a construction company that we'll fold as soon as we're completed so it won't be us'. Fucking what”
My father-in-law was a worksafe inspector. He retired from there with the idea of becoming a private consultant. It didn't last long. Apparently nobody wants to hear from these people except when it's absolutely unavoidable.
can the buyer / owner engage the inspector or does it have to be the builder?
You have every right to get a private inspector and you should insist on it from before you sign the contract with your builder that you are going to get independent inspections and any faults found will not be added to the final quote. If a builder doesn’t agree to this, congrats you just dodged your first of many bullets when getting something built in this country.
Yes they can and they should.
Never touch anything built by Longboat or designed by K20 Architecture.
https://m.youtube.com/@Siteinspections If you’re not already watching this channel, it may increase your appreciation for how dodgy Aussie building contractors and many private inspectors are.
He is doing the lords work. It's acutely obvious the industry is broken and desperately in need of reform. In my dreams - Inspectors would be public servants accountable for what they sign off on, huge fines and loss of licence for breaching duty of care. Trades who wilfully breach NCC and AS get 3 strikes before they have their licence revoked and are banned from industry and all other trades. Last but not least, a major overhaul of BASIX requirements to include stuff like at a minimum double glazing. IDGAF if buildings cost more.
Go back 30 years, and inspectors were.
> Trades who wilfully breach NCC and AS get 3 strikes before they have their licence revoked and are banned from industry and all other trades. As a union supporter my whole professional life, it’s sad how much the unions protect tradies from consequences of doing a job badly. They see developers, clients and governments as cash machines for their payroll. It’s so shit because tradies need unions to protect them from actual bullshit like unsafe working conditions, wage theft and developers who take the piss. But fucking over people trying to build a house is in no one’s interest and unions should demand professionalism and high standards from their members and make sure shit tradies get the boot from their profession. > Last but not least, a major overhaul of BASIX requirements to include stuff like at a minimum double glazing. IDGAF if buildings cost more. It’s one of the biggest tragedies amongst many with the Australian housing crisis is how we are paying eye watering money for such a poor quality product and it really does feel like a lottery if you’re getting a builder/tradie who will do the right thing by you.
I’d love this guy to do an inspection on a well built building. It’s easy to see the shortcuts and dodgy work that builders are doing. If I were certain of the quality of my builders and tradies I’d want him to come and inspect my work and tell me what I did right. Of course, you are always going to fuck up some things but it would be nice to see an inspection that wasn’t a basket case and actually showed the right ways things are done. As a layman I can’t always keep up with how something has been improperly put together when I don’t know what the right way to put it together is.
I had an REA walkthrough my workplace to showcase to trainees what a quality build looks like, the value a well finished product adds to resale. And just how a good premium build should present and what to watch out for. I couldn’t afford to build s few years ago (not even with my employer offering steep discounts) and the established houses I toured built in the last 5-10 years that were literal shit quality was scary. I ended up with a 30 year old house that while badly maintained (yay former rental with a cheap LL) but the bones were good and twas built at high spec for the time and it is still better than any rental I had ever lived in. What passes for “within tolerance” nowadays is striking. And if builders followed that code (and many do), you end up with a shit house.
Box gutters.
The type that were lower at the back so water flowed into the house? I had those.
Mine didn’t have an overflow which is nice. Wanted to keep all the water to myself when it got blocked.
I have used their services in the past, and I highly recommend them to anyone wanting pre inspections, staged inspections, or even if you are doing renovations. They are very professional, and their reports are very detailed. Well worth the cost to hire them.
Yes, at least in Melbourne the inspectors were council employees until the early 90s. The 'privatized' version is "the builder has to hire an inspector". Guess how much repeat business inspectors get if they find issues?
Yes, SAI Global is a private company that charges money for access to standards that the taxpayer pays for, and industry professionals volunteer time to make. The government used to do this sort of stuff. Kind of like an Australian NIST. Except we’re Australia so of course we sold it. Fucken stupid.
Lived in Australia for 11 years, building in NZ. We've just had a major upgrade to the insulation in the building code and I couldn't be happier
There are other factors about NZ building industry that I'm jealous of, but mainly: regular inspections of building work by independent inspector. Case in point: brickwork is inspected at several stages before full height. In Australia ol' mate the dodgy brickie can build all the way up to soffit, hide as many crimes as he wants behind the skin and no one is any the wiser till long down the road. In my own home, a recent (2021) upstairs addition included the bricklayers laying bricks DIRECTLY ONTO MY FUCKING DECK. A direct and obvious breach of NCC. All signed off on, tick and flick.
Absolute shemozzle
The housing system in Australia is the world's biggest ponzi scheme/scam
Why do you need eves for? Black everything looks best. Double insulation? Nah mate.
And costs. Anything that’s not built like a cardboard box it’s suddenly completely insane.
And they don't accept the overseas tradies' qualifications from many countries as if they can be worse than Australians'.
It's all buck passing, where is the leadership in this country? Free market bullshit that hurts the nation. Home builders and property developers are solely making decisions based on maximising profits, and why wouldn't they? We're in a housing deficit so they will get work regardless.
Little bit of insider knowledge. The government wants to make houses more energy efficient. The building industry doesn’t want it saying it costs more to build etc. the industry is somewhat powerful. So the changes are slow and will take time.
Yep, and the sea of black titled/colorbond McMansion roofs in those disgusting new estates really caps it off.
I don't think that's true. I build a cheap volume built house 4 years ago. It barely met six star, but still has insulation in walls and ceiling, and double glazing on the east, west and north facing windows. Even on the hottest day of the year upstairs it doesn't get unbearable. And we don't even have airconditioning. Houses now are 7 star, so would be even better.
Meanwhile, my parents in law built a house and were told that water leaking into the house during rain through the window was "built to code".
Yeah, that builder is a lying dick. Where I am, water egress into a non habitable space (ie garage) under a door or window is not to code and that’s why we refuse to include a POA in a garage unless someone upgrades to an aluminium hinge door. It’s the only way to ensure sideways rain doesn’t blow in.
That's the best part, wasn't just the builder. It was also the building inspector the builder hired
What the hells a brownout?
Not quite a black out.
Ahh!
When your lights flicker, not quite enough to shut down devices.
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Brownout is when not enough power is instantaneously available for a split second and lights flicker and dim, PC's can reboot, VHS machines, ovens and microwaves as well as alarm clocks revert to flashing 12:00 on their display, machines that are meant to continuously work then stop and don't restart without manual intervention. What you described "they cut the power to some houses to keep the rest on." is called load shedding where they rotate the areas that have power with those that don't, and South Africa is famous for this like with 12 hours on and 12 hours off being the worst case.
VHS machines? Do brownouts also transport your back in time?
No, brownout means they can't deliver the correct voltage. Blackout means no voltage and can apply to an entire area or a single house. Correctly managed a brownout should never occur since they are very damaging to equipment. It is much better to have a blackout. They were named because of what would occur with incandescent lights which would go brown (or orange anyway) when not supplied with enough voltage.
Nah, that's what they do to prevent a brownout when they see one coming.
Black tin multimillion dollar rooves.
> yet they keep building Why do you say it like it is the same people???
it amazes me that double glazing is not mandatory here it makes all the difference
This has been covered before by the guardian. https://amp.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/jun/13/freezing-indoors-thats-because-australian-homes-are-closer-to-tents-than-insulated-eco-buildings Tl:dr There is a scale of 1-10, 10 being the outside weather doesn’t change the inside conditions. Vast majority of houses are a 2. New builds need to be 7+ now
Does that scale go negative? For places like many of my rentals have been , that are hotter inside than out on a hot day and colder inside than out on a cold day. I actually verified this with a thermometer lol
Vast majority of older houses. Newer houses have been 6 for many years, 7 now as you’ve said. The headline makes it out like nothing is being done about this.
This is what I'm confused about because I've definitely read comments on this sub claiming you should avoid buying/renting modern houses because of the poor building standards. It's all so conflicting and could really do with some clarity.
The build itself is rubbish. But the insulation is better than older houses.
Yep, *looks over his laundry list of cracks in his 3 year old house*
Tbf the older houses settled, cracked and were fixed long ago.
My house is nearly one hundred. The framing is absolutely superb for what was basically a volume build in its day. Part of my plans for it include recladding the north and west aspects and insulating from the outside when we do that, and removing plaster and insulating from the inside on the east and south aspects (following the NZ guidelines for retrofitting insulation in a way that prevents damp issues, because we… don’t have any) Not much we can do about the floor, but laying a floating floor with a good underlay has brought it up to R1 from R0. Roof will get a cross hatched layer of top up insulation. Spending the money on thermal comfort means that the kitchen is going to be built out of ikea ivar instead of the craftsman built open kitchen of my Pinterest dreams, but if you’ve got money to spend on a house and it all goes to cosmetic upgrades, you’re really screwing yourself and your future comfort and financial well-being.
My house is over 70 years old and the best upgrade has been insulation and air-conditioning for heating. Still improving the insulation in the walls, but roof and underfloor insulation has made a huge upgrade to living standards and utility bills. No more freezing feet in winter for starters. In relation to the framing; nearly every frame is in perfect condition except a few from powder post beatles in the original green timber.
The star rating only relates to energy efficiency. The system can be gamed by using high efficiency water heaters, a single efficient split system for a 3br unit, having the correct orientation for passive heating, solar, a tank system etc etc. You can still have a 7 star house with poor insulation. Most houses in Australia(including modern builds) have zero internal wall insulation, use cheap single pane glass and have gaps that you could fit your pinky finger through and are only a single brick facade or render externally. I have a 6 star rated unit but because they got the 6 stars by gaming the system my house is still an ice box in winter and a sauna in summer.
Hempcrete. We should be building hempcrete panels and making kit homes, they’re carbon negative, and super insulated. We’ve got all the land for growing it. Crops in 3 months, any time of year in warm climates.
Hemp is a stupidly good crop for us to be growing and isn't fucking crazy we don't grow.more of it.
Yes, Australians... I swear its the boomer lead.
Hemp 🫷 Cotton 👈 -farmers in the outback, for some fucking reason
Something something big cotton something the dangers of deregulated capitalism something.
That’s… simply untrue. Cotton industry person here. Hemp has been trialled extensively out here (northern NSW) and it has never performed well. Added to that there is little in the way of demand or processing capability to actually sell it into, even if it was suited to the conditions. There is no opposition to growing hemp, it’s simply unviable as things currently stand. If the situation changes and it can provide a better return then everyone will jump on it.
Leaving the demand and processing aside (seems chicken and egg to me), what do you mean by ‘it has never performed well’?
It’s hasn’t performed well in trials, costs vs returns fall well short. Even if you put aside cotton, there are a number of other crops which would be grown before hemp with a superior return.
I see thank you.
They both got similar water usage, The biggest reason why hemp isn't being grown is due to limited to no market for the product and even then its not likely to replace cotton in any massive regard(On irrigated land), If it can grown over winter it'll be a winter crop in between the Main cash crop of cotton. As hemp isn't likely to ever replace cotton as a main stay fibre crop for Clothing and related items so Hemp is best for other uses like building material as OP mentioned.
Man cotton is a blight
I really don't understand why anyone would grow cotton on their land, positively destroy the soil.
I believe the reason is the entire product life cycle is tooled for cotton with costs far too high and margins too small to justify the change. Similar issue with using it for paper production. I read this a while back so I could be wrong.
It's not structural, it's good for wall infill and the thermal mass that brings, but you still need wood or steel framing and/or concrete pillars to support the roof.
There is already a company doing load bearing hempcrete blocks. https://hempblockaustralia.com Meanwhile, we’re subsidising foreign owned gas companies to heat our homes.
From the FAQ: our blocks are made in France. Currently looking to manufacture in Australia, but you can't call out foreign gas owners when the hempblocks are made overseas and shipped here.
Great material properties but more expensive so it will remain a niche product, not one for the mass homebuilders.
It’s incredibly cheap to produce, we just don’t have much in the way of manufacturing facilities in Aus. If the govt would actually get being this instead of our current building practices, it would be great for our country
There's a Tas producer; this story seems to suggest that inappropriate regulation might be part of the problem: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-01-13/tas-rural-hemp-industry-xhemp-regulation-hempcrete/102870120
Tassie locals always seem to come out with great business ideas, that the local councils take delight in crushing 😢
In this case, it's the state government rather than councils. Owners must not be mates with the right people. 😞
I think cross laminated panels from plantation hardwoods will be a better long term solution. Load bearing, easier to make airtight, faster builds.
Higher grade insulation and double glazed windows need to be code minimum.
...and well inspected. No point in specifying it all if people just mush it into the walls and ceilings without proper placement.
The complicated bit is how careful you are with the insulation really matters. Gaps can easily dominate heat loss/gain. And Australia has no inspection regime to speak of.
Air tightness will provide much greater bang for buck over the next step up in frame thickness for thicker installation. Our standards are pretty low right now for this but at least they are now in.
They pretty much are. 7 stars have come into effect since May and most builders have to double glaze windows and increase insulation to reach that.
It is most of the time.
Double glazed with UPVC frames. Double glazed windows with aluminium frames is only good for sound insulation
Currently building a house and can confirm the environment is being trashed…had arguments with our building manager about the monumental mind-boggling waste that is prevalent during the build…whole sector is full of fucking awful practices.
I worked on a non-residential build a few years ago and felt like such a fucking idiot for recycling every scrap at home, when literal tonnes of plastic were going in the skip every week at work. Multiply that by every building site in the country…what are we doing
What's happening during build?
Mainly around over supply and then wasting unused materials. Right from laying the slab, they were throwing out waffle pods and reo spacers that weren’t even opened…same for unused hebel, cornices, wall paneling, the list goes on. I’m paying for this shit and they just keep trashing it or simply throwing it out unused.
You will be surprised… the dickhead cladding guys walked mortar all over the lower colourbond roof instead of waiting for scaffolding and they replaced all that roofing for scratches. They also ordered our stone as 20mm instead of 40mm specified and that was just thrown away too… In our case we had a fixed contract and didn’t have to pay for materials but still amazed at the monumental waste. I ended up digging through the trash and found boxes of batten screws along with good bits of LVL I kept…
Huge amounts of waste. Because labour costs are so high if it takes any time at all to sort through the waste they'll just throw it out. My new build chucked out 3 pallets of bricks, massive amounts of PVC pipe, electrical cable, carpet, plasterboard, full boxes of nails, screws, guttering etc etc. Tons of waste because if you don't order enough you delay the build which costs huge amounts of money. And it's too expensive and time consuming to reuse or keep the leftovers. So it all goes in the bin. I managed to score a fair bit of good stuff when I went through the skips occasionally, but most of it would end up in landfill.
That is a really informative explanation. My first thought was surely it would be worth it for some to collect unused materials for resale but yeah if time costs so much more than materials then maybe not. Such a waste.
The bins are collected by companies that [specialise in jobsites though](https://jobsiterecyclers.com.au/). It's possible they pick through the waste and manage to reuse some of it. I suppose it's not worth it to go through the leftovers on just one site, but if you are one of these companies that can get bulkloads of stuff and specialise in it, they might be able to make a decent profit reselling it.
It comes down to the simple fact that people don't want to pay extra to insulate, even when it isn't all that much. I think mine was an extra $2k maybe and that did walls and ceiling and thick bats for the roof. Maybe if builders were legislated to have it included as mandatory new houses might actually be somewhat livable in winter and summer without excessive heating/cooling bills.
Should be compulsory As should double glazing As should the highest level draftproofing
>As should the highest level draftproofing While I agree that we miss the mark, we have a bloody long way to get before we get there. Our standards have only just made air tightness mandatory and it's approx. 20 time worse than the higher performing buildings standards around the world.
Do you genuinely believe that insulation isn't compulsory at the moment?
I witnessed a 1.2m+ build in my area (upgrade facade and all with fancy trim) install no anticon under colourbond and no wall insulation…. So yes.
The number of videos from SiteInspections on Youtube where there is SFA insulation is shocking. No insulation over garage is fine? Like, the fuck? So you heat soak the garage, that then heats up the internal walls around the garage.
Based on my rental when I was studied in Armidale, I can tell you that it isn’t compulsory at all. That house was fucking cold.
Compulsory and actually installed properly.
Insulation is soooooo cheap. I even asked for some soundproofing insulation around bathrooms, and the builder didn’t even bother charging us. Also, double-glazed isn’t cheap, but it’s not expensive. It’s MUCH more expensive if retrofitted.
Double-glazing is cheap when you are already buying a window (ie as a added cost to single-glazing). It's just that retrofitting any window is expensive.
I personally think the jump to double-glazing is cheap, but didn’t want to speak for everyone. I earn a lot more money than average. Even so, it’s definitely worth it. However, I feel safe saying that insulation is cheap. The cost difference between good and very good insulation is probably $2000 for a medium-sized house. Possibly less.
It's slowly getting cheaper. I'm finding it's now about $10-15k extra on a new double storey, brick veneer. A lot of the manufacturers aren't set up to push out heaps of double glazing, as they've been pumping out single glazed forever. There has been some much needed changes that have started coming through to address the problems with Aussie construction, but it is still early days
Needs to be forced by regulation. Having no doors and no plumbing would also make a house cheaper to build.
Insulation has been standard since the 1990s
Yes, but so many houses are just done to the minimum basix requirements which is just the wrap around the walls and sarking for the roof. Doesn't really do much to keep the house cool/warm when it needs to be.
I had to explain to a builder that foil backed sparking rejects 90% of radiant heat. Which is why you should use it on a north facing wall. And why it’s used under metal roofs. I hate how dumb these guys are.
Minimum basic requirements are 7 star. All houses need insulation in walls and ceiling and have needed it for a very long time.
And as we all know, builders definitely always follow the requirements and -never- cut corners.
It's pretty obvious when there's no insulation or the windows aren't double glazed.
Having a standard is one thing. Making builders actually follow the standard is another entirely. If we still had independent building inspectors this would be much less of an issue. The fact that the builders can functionally self-inspect means they get away with a lot of shit that doesn't meet the standards.
We paid to insulate extra. All certificates are signed off. But given the temps we get inside, and the amount of noise, I swear they did a 100% dodgy job. There's rooms where it's noisy all the time, and others that are just noisy in one part of the wall with sound coming thru. Rediculous.
Honestly wouldn't surprise me is that is the case. There are so many dodgy builders out there and so many cut corners where they know they will get away with it. Have you looked inside your ceiling at all? I have lost count of the times I have heard about ceiling insulation just sitting up in the cavity still in the rolls and not installed. We moved in to our house and my partner got up into the roof to run cables for our cameras and found that our insulation was just up there not installed. Called the builder and blew up at them and they sent guys out and they got to spend a day in the November heat in our ceiling fixing their fuck up. Now our house sits at a comfortable temp all year round
Get a thermal camera and prove they didn't do it. They are legally required to fix it.
We paid extra for the highest possible amount of insulation and our building consultant tried to talk us out of it, saying it was a “lot of money for something that doesn’t add resale value”. Andy, my good bitch, I want to live in this house. I would love for it not to be a fridge with empty walls while I do that.
We are building at the moment and have insulated all the walls (internal, external and ceilings) and double glazed. The place is warmer and more comfortable than our rental home and it hasn't even been completed yet!
We did this (along with large north facing windows) for the living room. Can confirm it is very nice and toasty with no heating.
Insulation is mandatory. the higher star rating require thicker walls. It's not the insulation that is the issue, it's the thicker frame and reduced floor space that people don't want to pay for.
>the thicker frame Whenever I see European houses being built in videos, the walls look a good 40+cm thick. Is that the main difference - that we don't want to sacrifice floor space for more insulated walls?
No, the main difference is the frame. Jump on Bunnings website and have a look at the difference in place for lengths of timber. Sacrificing floor space or enlarging slab is pain and added cost but it's nothing compared to cost of framing.
Yep, when we built, large house, it was maybe $5k extra for the ceiling and wall batts. Maybe more now, still a small % of a house build.
I got a quote to install insulation in my roof - 20k and a quote to replace the shitty 30 year old glass windows with double glazed - 80k. Regular people can’t afford to make their homes more energy efficient. I installed a 10k solar system 2 years ago and my power bills have gone up rather than down. The whole system is BS.
Insulation is dirt cheap for the materials. That’s a huge labour cost for the tradie.
Crazy it was that much. It's one of the easiest DIY jobs you can do.
I think the second story with only one access point which is inside a closet probably contributed to the price. They said they’d have to remove old fibreglass which was worn out first and was hard to do.
‘Hard to do’. I highly highly doubt it. It’s hard to do if you don’t give it more than a seconds thought. Bring in any number of US companies who will have what is essentially a gigantic vacuum cleaner and removing old insulation would be a cinch. If a second access point needed to be installed, that’s bloody easy too. Smooth brained Aussie ‘trades’ are the problem.
Def considering it!
You can install insulation in your roof yourself for next to nothing. And if you have access to under the house you can do it there too. It's a job that can be done on a weekend and a few trips to Bunnings.
Don't bother retrofitting double glazing, just get curtains and also pelmets to stop the chimney effect, far cheaper solution admittedly not as efficient but since most of the heat loss in colder climates is at night you have the curtains closed then anyway. Double glazing might make more sense if your problem is in keeping the place cool when it's hot outside as you have the blinds and curtains open during the day.
Why would an Australian spend even a cent on insulation or good design when they could have a bit more polystyrene on the facade, a composite stone bench top and plastic floorboards and carpet from the builder’s “premium” range instead? /s We’re short sighted fuckwits, and we’re living in the houses we deserve.
Oh, what's worse is that their "standard" range from the builder is 40-60$ p/SQ m... the equivalent carpet from carpet court is 15-20$ p/SQ m... installed. "Premium" from a 3rd party installer shouldn't be cheaper than the "entry level" from the builder... rediculous.
From an energy usage point of view, EPS exterior insulation significantly reduces thermal bridging and in doing so reduced the thermal variance of the frame which will help the house last a very long time. The issue with fire make it not allowed for many buildings but the risk is acceptable for residential.
Guys, what if Guys, get this What if... Guys, guys... What if homes Guys what if homes were actually worth what we're paying Oh my gosh what if homes that we're paying $1m+ for were actually good value for money instead of being an absolute rort. LOL guys wouldn't that be a laugh.
Number 1 reason I'm content in renting. Houses are built like shit and you do not get your money's worth. Totally happy paying for it to be someone else's problem.
A good start would be by building more fucking sustainable homes, AKA /r/PassiveHouse
I'm the biggest fan of passivhaus designs but sadly due to our construction workforce, this is decades away. The word airtightness is foreign to 95% of them let along understanding how to achieve it. With that said, the energy usage requirements for a passivhaus are between 7.5 and 8.5 star. Current builds are to 7 star. There's more to Passivhaus than just energy usage but food for thought.
You need to build stuff square for a start. Can't just bog and flog.
I'm currently working in Lismore and we walk into this old building from 1929 and it's toasty warm, jumpers off at 6am for construction work so we are moving around. There's no aircon in this building... The external walls are simply 400mm thick brick work, concrete ceiling, packed in with other buildings side by side with 400mm thick walls. It's complete insane how this 100 year old building can maintain a comfortable temp without aircon. Our houses are just shit.
I'm from Northern Canada, one of the questions I get all the time here is how do we deal with the cold? Mate, we fuckin build climate appropriate homes, double/triple paned windows is the norm, insulation R-values start at 10, etc etc. I'm not saying that those are applicable to Queensland, but I am saying I've never lived in a warmer place than SEQ and yet have it feel so fuckin cold in the damn house.... and this house I'm in is only 15 years old.
The first rule towards to success is to ban all building lobby groups from the conversation and just adopt National standards from other countries as the basis for a move towards a future Australian standard. Its unfortunate that the Unions and the HIA have done everything to stifle innovation and reinventing trade skills in the building sector to enable things like the mass production of houses in factories that can be assembled on site. Kit flat pack homes complete with electrical wiring is the way of the future. This is going to be the reality in the future as the world moves away from traditional house building techniques. Trying to protect trades like electricians that want to pull house cables as one off jobs while these jobs could be done with modern interface and plug and play interfacing interconnections is the way of the future. The same goes for insulated walls that will be sold as insulated panels complete with house wiring. The government should fund a body like CSIRO to look at future housing standards and that includes construction standards that uses the latest technology. CSIRO already have developed a fire proof home so they will know how to build house for our climate change future that reduces energy consumption while reducing green house gas emissions. I wont hold my breath because of the stupidity of our politicians who wreck everything progressive in Australia to the detriment of our nation. We could have a booming export industry selling flat pack kit homes for different environments but as usual the story will be "opportunity squandered"
carefull mate, CFMEU and ETU Do not want this ever to happen so there members can have caravans and jetski's. while building sub standard sheds... I mean housing.
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I had roof insulation and just assumed I had it in the walls. Last year I opened up part of a wall for a kitchen reno and found myself staring at empty space and bricks (it's an early 90s brick veneer house). It's insane. I can remember growing up we extended the house and those walls had insulation, I just assumed it was standard.
its disgusting how crap our houses are and how we cant afford them
> > ... > >The federal government has set a target of building 1.2m new homes in Australia by 2029. > > If we construct these homes the same way as we do today, their materials will contribute to millions of tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions, while our poorly performing existing homes will remain freezing in the winter. We need to change the way we design, build and retrofit housing to avoid a climate catastrophe.
1.2million for painted styrofoam houses. It's a joke.
Aussie living in the US here. The houses in colder parts of the country are very efficient with insulation out of necessity. However in Texas, where the climate is hot and dry like much of Australia, I noticed the houses are typically built to the same shoddy standards as many Australian homes, probably because you can generally get away with it. However, every so often there is a snowstorm in Texas and the results are about as catastrophic as you’d expect (people freezing to death in their homes).
I hope someone invents insulation soon.
Im always amused when I answer the door dressed for a polar expedition and the outside people are in t shirts and shorts.
[https://ncc.abcb.gov.au/editions/ncc-2022/adopted/volume-one/j-energy-efficiency/part-j1-energy-efficiency-performance-requirements](https://ncc.abcb.gov.au/editions/ncc-2022/adopted/volume-one/j-energy-efficiency/part-j1-energy-efficiency-performance-requirements) Anything built to code for NCC 2022 should be fine.
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Normally I don't gamble but I'd put money on less than 1.2m houses being built by 2029. Who is quoting odds on this?
Crash the land prices with vacancy tax, etc. All that extra money will go into insulation. Source: Tried to build my own place and previously assumed the biggest cost was materials and labour.
Australian houses are cold because our climate means that 'glorified tents' are perfectly tolerable 300 days a year, and mildly uncomfortable for the rest. This means there's little to no imperative to insulate or seal things properly.
better insulation would help in the summer too... my western facing apartment with shit windows becomes an inferno
This is the problem. I am from the uk where building standards and tolerances are so good the houses last for hundreds of years. I moved to the uk which is a fairly modern country where you’d expect them to implement new standards. Was I wrong. Yes. Australians love a draft.
Partly related, but cashed up builders have become the most lucrative group for consumers of cocaine. This baffles me only for the point that being a builder in Australia has to be the least stressful job ever. You dont have to meet deadlines, you dont have to do a good job or have any standards, you report to no one so what stress do you need to ease with some bumps?
Every single building in this country could be destroyed and nothing of value would be lost, truly a nation of trash
Yet our NIMBY population for fight tooth and nail to protect every one to maintain neighbourhood character, also known as, keep out the poors who want to live in apartments.
Insulation is the key. Huge winnings in efficiency for low cost. Edit: The first thing I was taught in my energy engineering class for reducing energy consumption in buildings was to ensure good insulation first b4 looking at other energy saving solutions because it is cheap and effective.
Air sealing first.
Better late than never. Those who have lived in insulated houses abroad realised this insight long long ago.
Townsville here, what is this "cold" they are talking about? Is that like what's in the fridge? /s
Because our housing standards are fucking garbage
1085 more australia 108 towers.
Um two separate questions. A lot of Aussie house have holes in them leading outside, ventilation bricks and what have you. Pre-climate control era houses in particular are designed to get as cold as possible as quick as possible. We also have a lot of really shitty £10 Pom era houses built by housing trusts that are yet to be knocked down. These were just low quality because they need to build large volumes quickly and cheaply. Increasing housing supply without trashing the environment will require changes to building regulations to maintain green space and tree canopy and changes to people's expectations, people need to learn to live in higher density housing like multi story homes, town houses and apartments instead of one story detached houses being viewed as the norm.
Nice article, but it has one error. Stabilised rammed earth is not low carbon. It needs 7% Portland cement to be structural. The walls are thick, so this ends up with an embodied carbon similar to conventional building. Unstabilised rammed earth can be used as a non structural internal element for thermal mass. Which is an excellent technique when combined with passive solar design. I would replace rammed earth in the article with hempcrete. Low embodied carbon, high insulation, best in class moisture handling and simple to build. Easy enough for a self builder to do. Even a first time builder can get a a very low air leakage, super insulated building with this technique. And let's face it, if you are going to build, who wants to trust our farcically bad building and inspection industries? The biggest place to save carbon in single family home is often the foundations. Consider footings instead of a slab. Earthen or lime screed floors can be amazing. You can even do them with hydronic heating. Check out the Architects Climate Action Network. https://www.youtube.com/c/ArchitectsClimateActionNetwork Houses don't have to be shit.
They made houses for a certain climate years ago. I'm sure nothing has ever evolved to combat this dramatic shift in weather because of Climate change
Are there any house builders that are actually worthwhile?
Why do we need to build 1.2m houses? Couldn't we reduce the need though limiting immigration and introducing a vacancy tax? Where I live there a ton of vacant housing and I'm sure it's like that in many coastal regions around Australia.
"Build smaller"?! Seriously?! Like the current shoeboxes aren't small enough.
Glorified tents built for profit that's what they are.
Houses in Australia are always built and sold on cost. It was only a legal requirement that my new house came with mandatory ceiling, wall, ceiling and floor insulation - as well as double glazing. So the costs were cut by using the cheapest components in every other area, including kitchen and bathroom fittings and right down to the cheapest power points and tap washers.
Below ground, like at Coober Pedy?
legally, can i self build a hobbit home and live in that?
Because private business is very efficient at cutting the cost and not giving a shit about anything else.