Latest / Best of Business / Chris Litten: Building Research Association expert on whether more insulation makes your house too hot

Transcript

Chris Litten: Building Research Association expert on whether more insulation makes your house too hot · Best of Business

• 0:09
  Speaker 1: You're listening to a podcast from Newstalk ZEDB. Follow this
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: and our wide range of podcasts now on iHeartRadio.
• 0:17
  Speaker 2: A study from the Building Research Association has found that
• 0:20
  Speaker 2: indoor summer temperatures have gone up six to ten percent
• 0:24
  Speaker 2: in the last twenty years. That's inside during summer tempts
• 0:28
  Speaker 2: up six to twenty it's too ten percent in the
• 0:31
  Speaker 2: last twenty years. And the new insulation standards that came
• 0:35
  Speaker 2: into force in twenty twenty three aren't to blame for this.
• 0:40
  Speaker 2: The study found that homes of all ages are overheating.
• 0:44
  Speaker 2: Doctor Chris Listen is a Building Research Association General manager
• 0:47
  Speaker 2: of Research. Welcome to the show, Chris, Hi, Ryan, how
• 0:50
  Speaker 2: are you?
• 0:50
  Speaker 3: Yeah? Good?
• 0:51
  Speaker 2: Thank you. First of all, I asked Laura, who's our
• 0:54
  Speaker 2: producer here. I wanted to find out whether you've got
• 0:56
  Speaker 2: any skin in the game here are you? You know,
• 0:58
  Speaker 2: you've got shares and insulation companies anything like this, But
• 1:02
  Speaker 2: you're you're quite independent. I've found out.
• 1:05
  Speaker 3: Yeah, we're completely independent. I am Brains's all about providing
• 1:09
  Speaker 3: for next independent advice into the system. So that's what
• 1:12
  Speaker 3: we're about. Brilliant.
• 1:13
  Speaker 2: Okay, So two things. One, it's getting hotter inside what's
• 1:17
  Speaker 2: the temperature, I mean, how hot are we talking in summer?
• 1:22
  Speaker 3: Some people are saying it's somewhere between twenty five and
• 1:25
  Speaker 3: thirty degrees and that's for some people that feels really hot.
• 1:28
  Speaker 3: And I think one of the really interesting things from
• 1:31
  Speaker 3: the study shows that Willingtonians are likely to say it's
• 1:33
  Speaker 3: two women in their homes despite them actually being colder
• 1:36
  Speaker 3: than the people in Auckland who are saying it's quite comfortable.
• 1:39
  Speaker 3: So it's really about perception about what people are actually
• 1:42
  Speaker 3: settling like they're in their homes.
• 1:44
  Speaker 2: What do people feel like is a good temperature?
• 1:47
  Speaker 3: Again, that really comes down to personal preference. Like I'm
• 1:50
  Speaker 3: in Wellington. I think if my home was twenty five degrees,
• 1:53
  Speaker 3: I'd feel it's pretty warm. But you know, that would
• 1:55
  Speaker 3: be quite different to someone else than from Auckland or
• 1:57
  Speaker 3: from christ Church. But I think at the end of
• 2:00
  Speaker 3: the day, there's actually no agreed definition of when it's
• 2:04
  Speaker 3: too hot. The world health organizations see something between over
• 2:08
  Speaker 3: forty degrees is probably not good, which is probably right,
• 2:11
  Speaker 3: but it's not actually a real measure of saying when
• 2:13
  Speaker 3: it's when hot is too hot.
• 2:15
  Speaker 2: Now, one of the things you looked at was the
• 2:17
  Speaker 2: new insulation standards that came into fours in twenty twenty three.
• 2:20
  Speaker 2: You've said that they're not to blame for our houses
• 2:23
  Speaker 2: getting warmer. That doesn't make sense to me.
• 2:27
  Speaker 3: It's two parts of Actually. First of all, none of
• 2:30
  Speaker 3: the houses in the survey actually had that new insulation
• 2:33
  Speaker 3: levels in them, so we can certainly say that didn't
• 2:36
  Speaker 3: make any difference. But I think the other thing that
• 2:38
  Speaker 3: we have shown in this work of insulation also keeps
• 2:41
  Speaker 3: the heat out, so no one is it keeping you
• 2:44
  Speaker 3: warm in winter, which is a really great thing, but
• 2:46
  Speaker 3: also keeps the heat out in summer. I think what
• 2:49
  Speaker 3: we're really seeing is that homes are really complex, complex constructions.
• 2:56
  Speaker 3: There's a lot that you need to think about. There's insulation,
• 2:59
  Speaker 3: there is the amount of windows you've got, how much
• 3:01
  Speaker 3: sun's coming in, how much shade you have and haven't got,
• 3:04
  Speaker 3: if they're facing north or south. It's really complex, and
• 3:07
  Speaker 3: that's what we're really trying to trying to get across
• 3:10
  Speaker 3: to everybody really right there. To design things right and
• 3:13
  Speaker 3: to build them properly, they need to actually if you're
• 3:15
  Speaker 3: living them, you need to open the window and insulate them.
• 3:18
  Speaker 2: So none of the homes you looked at actually had
• 3:20
  Speaker 2: the new standard of insulation.
• 3:23
  Speaker 3: So that's correct.
• 3:24
  Speaker 2: So therefore you can say, well, they're still getting hot,
• 3:26
  Speaker 2: but how do you know that they wouldn't have gotten
• 3:29
  Speaker 2: even hotter had they had that level.
• 3:33
  Speaker 3: Well, again, it comes back to that complex relationship between
• 3:36
  Speaker 3: everything that's in the in the house. Is that there's
• 3:40
  Speaker 3: a lot there's a lot of people who don't have
• 3:42
  Speaker 3: any shaving at all coming into your really large open
• 3:44
  Speaker 3: windows and onto concrete four. So insulation is one part
• 3:48
  Speaker 3: of it, but it's not that it's not the only
• 3:50
  Speaker 3: thing that's contributing to things getting warmer.
• 3:52
  Speaker 2: Okay, is there anything you want changed? You know, whether
• 3:56
  Speaker 2: it's to do with insulation or anything else with the
• 3:59
  Speaker 2: building code, anything you want change to cool our houses down?
• 4:03
  Speaker 3: I think the building code has always been update and
• 4:07
  Speaker 3: people always thinking about That's not our job. We provide
• 4:10
  Speaker 3: advice to the government that does do that. But at
• 4:12
  Speaker 3: the end of the day, people need to think of
• 4:14
  Speaker 3: the game. That's the whole The whole building code, the
• 4:16
  Speaker 3: whole system is helistic. Things are a complex. You change
• 4:20
  Speaker 3: one thing and something else will change. You need to
• 4:22
  Speaker 3: consider that in the whole process of designing and building
• 4:26
  Speaker 3: your homes.
• 4:26
  Speaker 2: Okay, does everyone get will we all need air conditioning
• 4:30
  Speaker 2: at some point? And it's so, when do you think
• 4:32
  Speaker 2: that might be?
• 4:34
  Speaker 3: I don't know about that. I think there's always some
• 4:37
  Speaker 3: way you to operate your home besore. It doesn't have
• 4:40
  Speaker 3: to be with their conditioning. You can intellect properly. You
• 4:44
  Speaker 3: can close the windows that you know, close your blinds
• 4:47
  Speaker 3: at the right time. You can put some shaving, plant
• 4:49
  Speaker 3: a big tree outside your window. There's lots of ways
• 4:51
  Speaker 3: to cool things down when you actually need to put
• 4:55
  Speaker 3: a calling pump and the air conditioning. And I don't
• 4:58
  Speaker 3: know that's going to be very game, very much for
• 5:00
  Speaker 3: people how they feel that they're perception of living in
• 5:02
  Speaker 3: their homers.
• 5:03
  Speaker 2: Interesting, Chris, thank you for that. I appreciate your time. Welcome,
• 5:06
  Speaker 2: doctor Christ and Building Research Decis Ocean, General manager of research.
• 5:09
  Speaker 2: Very independent man.
• 5:11
  Speaker 1: For more from News Talk st B, listen live on
• 5:14
  Speaker 1: air or online, and keep our shows with you wherever
• 5:17
  Speaker 1: you go with our podcasts on iHeartRadio.