Call for net carbon zero features and swift boxes at Valley Park

Letter from Sustainable Harwell

Hello – I am writing as Chair of Sustainable Harwell.  We are a Community Action Group operating in Harwell village.  We work on sustainability projects to help tackle climate change, reduce waste and pollution and improve the environment in the Harwell area.

Valley Park is proceeding and we are interested to see Taylor Wimpey’s plans for the initial Primrose development.  We are sorry that we were not able to attend the exhibition which took place in November. 

Before Taylor Wimpey submits the Reserved Matters (RM) Application for Primrose we hope that they will consider the following points which relate to the section titles which were used in the original exhibition boards.

1. Protecting and preserving the natural environment

Harwell village has a small but important swift population.  As with many other birds, swifts are now on the red list of endangered bird species having suffered significant population decline over recent decades.  Residents in Harwell village are helping to address this degradation by retrofitting swift boxes to their houses as well as community facilities such as the Village Hall.   

However, retrofitting boxes is only one solution and in the development of Valley Park there is now an excellent opportunity to introduce swift bricks as “universal” nest bricks during the construction process of the houses.  Please see the attached leaflet for much more detail regarding this.  

We note that Taylor Wimpey has already used swift bricks at housing developments throughout Cambridgeshire.  See Taylor Wimpey creates new homes for endangered Swifts throughout Cambridgeshire | Cambridge Network. .  We hope you will consider the introduction of similar bricks on the houses at the Primrose development and the rest of Valley Park and would welcome your view on this.

2. Benefits for our customers and the local community

While we would expect all new homes to be built to the highest standards of insulation, we are dismayed to note that there appears to be no provision for the integration of roof mounted solar panels or the installation of heat pumps at the houses to be constructed at Primrose.

The UK now requires enormous amounts of renewable energy generation in order to decarbonise the grid and opportunities for installing PV on the roofs of houses during construction should not be missed.  We note that solar panels are being built into the roofs of many new houses in the surrounding area, for example Wantage, and would question why the same approach appears not to be planned for Primrose?  We request that Taylor Wimpey rethink their approach for this.  We believe that integrating roof solar during the building process while the scaffolding is present is much cheaper both economically and environmentally (in terms of carbon impact) than retrofitting them at a future date.

Additionally, houses being built with fossil fuelled gas boilers will be required to be retrofitted in the future as the UK progresses to net zero.  In our view this is a short-sighted strategy which potentially makes the properties less attractive to purchasers.    Installing air-source heat pumps at houses at Valley Park during construction should be a priority and we ask that Taylor Wimpey rethink the approach to this. 

We also believe that electric vehicle charging points should be provided at each house being built, as well as communal charging facilities for those properties which do not have off-street parking.

We hope these suggestions are helpful and look forward to hearing your views.

Best wishes
Giles Barwell
Chair Sustainable Harwell