#2 - The Human Element in Energy Efficiency with Ben Walsham

Jess Kismet (00:00)

Hello and welcome back to the Building Sciology Poddie where we talk about healthier buildings to live and breathe in. Today, my guest is Ben Walsham from Arkata He is a energy efficiency consultant focusing on healthy, energy efficient and resilient buildings. Welcome Ben and thanks for being here. No, thank you for having me. No worries at all. So you have been in the energy game for a reasonably short period. You started out in architecture.

and decided to move over into energy efficiency consulting. what, what, us through why you did that.

So I did Masters of Architecture, did my architecture school five years of uni. I joined a residential builder here in SA. And for a long time, I sort of had an immense learning experience through that. It was like very quick iterations. We would design a house, get it approved, and build it.

you know, within a year, like six months to 12 months, you were getting feedback on what you had designed, what you got approved and then what was built. And so through that process, you know, three or four years or so, three years, I think we felt longer. We, I learned a lot through that. And through that, it sort of showed me we can build better homes that are a bit more healthier.

And I love sustainability, have been sort of a sustainability person for as long as I can remember. I went to Thailand and that was a big eye-opening experience for me because we just, they just do things so much differently. And I was like, I want to contribute to what I'm so passionate about. And then I met this wonderful person called Jess at SUHO and she just opened my eyes to like, wow, there is like

such thing as a sustainability consultancy and people trying, you know, to advise on better buildings. And then all of a sudden there was this job that was shown on SEEK one day and it was by Jess, the person I had met a few weeks ago. And so I was just like, you know what, I'm going to apply for this. My parents hated it because I was leaving my degree pathway in life and I was like veering off in a different direction.

That was something that I felt really passionate about. I wanted to just jump ship and join the sustainability side of things. So yeah, that's what veered me off into that direction with my architecture background and being able to sort of help architects understand, you know, the possibilities is what we're all about. So you didn't know that there was such thing as an energy consultant when you left uni? No, no, not when I left uni. When I joined the builder and sort of slash architect, I...

very quickly understood, okay, you've got your timber framer, you've got your engineer, you've got energy reports coming in, you've got maybe sometimes fire, acoustics, like I very quickly understood, okay, well, there's all these consultants who do all these different components of the build. When you're going through architecture school, you are paired with, say, the engineering school, like they're very much very, very close to each other. Some people might be doing courses across the engineering and architecture.

sort of degrees. So you might have some people join the architecture degree who are currently doing engineering and vice versa. That was really about all you got at uni was like, okay, there's engineers. were, we know there's engineers out there, but when it come to energy, we maybe did one course on, you know, in five years, it was pretty shallow, I suppose, after what, you know, you and I know, and every day you learn something new. That's really all I knew.

architecture school. So then when I left and joined a business in building homes, that was when I was introduced to all these different sort of consultants who did different parts of that process. And I suppose the energy reports we got were just compliance reports. They weren't Green Star related or NABERS or any of these other energy sort of processes that I wasn't very familiar with.

So when I obviously met you and you're doing air tightness, was like, what the hell is air tightness? That was the first time I've ever heard of it. that was sort of, yeah, you introduced that to me and here we are today. So. Cool. Well, I am very pleased to have had such a positive influence on your career. Yes, you did. I remember we came and we did a building code.

a building code compliance workshop. was when the NCC 2019 was being, like we were transferring over to NCC 2019. And you guys at the time were interested in learning about it. So I joined, I think a month after we had transitioned all over to 2019. I had...

didn't really see what was going on before 2019. And when I came in and I was like, okay, well, 2019 is this. What's so hard guys. Yeah. obviously going, going from what we were on before to 2019 was a big jump. So I sort of like guys, this is, this is no worries. We should be able to just smash this out. when you're building homes for so long on a certain code, then you, it all ratchets up and changes. Obviously it's a, it's a big process, which

You and I have been going through this year with 2022. Yeah, any change is difficult when there's a process involved.

Okay, so here's another question. I guess directly related to what we just talking about. So these evolving building codes do have a significant impact on architectural design and construction practices. So from what you've seen from the building company side of it, and then the consultant side of it dealing directly with architects and builders, what impact do you see that having those changes? I mean, lots to begin with.

get specific, having the architecture background merging that with the energy efficiency when you are changing things in the software you get an understanding of what actually happens when you've sent that upgrade requirement or that change suggestion to the architect you know the two or three steps they have to take in order to even implement that change and it sometimes can be very easy from the energy efficiency side of things to be to just

change something in the model and it's like okay well we got a benefit from that okay that made us reach compliance but in actual fact that change while it's just a little tweak in the software in reality it's has ongoing consequences for that and so yeah i've got a couple of examples like architects love windows and glass and so when you and

The thing with architects is they're not usually putting something in a house or in a design just for the sake of it. It's usually a reason behind what they've done. And if you're coming in and changing something, you really have to understand why it's even there in the first place and try to work with that so that you can enhance the architecture, not make it a box that's well sealed and well insulated because that's just not going to happen. So you need to work with the architects and massage these things in. You can't just...

change a three meter tall window to 2400 because that will just completely ruin the whole aesthetics of the building. So you need to try and figure out, okay, where do I actually need to work my magic in order for it to actually make sense in the end game? And another one recently is around slab edge installation. We spoke about this. We've spoken about this at length. Slab edge installation is a very easy little like trick that we can do in the software that will get us a star rating boost in most cases. However,

Architects don't really know how to detail slab edge installation. And then we have builders who are hesitant to build with slab edge installation. And so when you're changing these things, there is an education pathway to be like, this is why we're doing the slab edge installation. And this is how we can then do it. And sometimes those answers aren't always easy on every project. So yeah, that's, that's my thoughts on that anyway. think that really rings true for me. I remember sitting at my desk and

you know, we were just bang foils in walls without really realizing what impact they would have on moisture management, for example, because that gave us a boost in the star rating and we just, it was just a click of a button and a simulation and yep, the numbers work great, go do that. Yeah, one of the things I've always sort of realized, yeah, having both sides of the fence of experience.

there's three islands, you've got your energy consultant on one island on the right side, you've got your homeowner on the island on the far left, then you've got an architect in the middle. And it's actually about building a bridge between those three islands and using the architect as a conduit to actually explain these things. the builder as well.

That's before islands, four islands in the builder. That's right. And so often the energy consultant and architects, especially moving forward, I advocate for early collaboration. And so often it is just the, is the, those three islands in that picture, usually when it's earlier in the process, the builder might not be part of that process yet. And they come in at a later stage. And so irrespective of three islands or four, they,

you need to be able to explain and share the story of what's actually happening in your house because that is what actually gets the changes done. If the homeowners are bought in and they're empowered to actually understand how their home operates and feels for them when they're going to live in it, there is more evidence, more motivation to then be able to explore slab edge installation or to be able to explore those window changes.

Whereas when we just say, this does this result to the star rating? There's no, you're not fostering any like buy-in or takes power away. Yeah. You're not, you're not fostering any sort of, control that you can then give to the homeowners over their own home and exploration and data like really does that. Just giving them an upgrade to get to seven. They don't learn from that process. The architects, especially obviously the homeowners are doing this once or twice in their lifetimes, but for those architects who are doing it.

you know, multiple times a year, they get to understand what's actually going on in a NatHERS assessment, whereas sometimes they just don't really know what's happening in that process. And so the education piece is just massive. And yeah, that's one of those things that having the sort of architectural background and the passion for energy efficiency has sort of enabled me to really explain it in that way for clients. So you mentioned earlier on, like early interaction with an energy assessor to

to do your modeling before it's too late. Are there any things that you've identified that could be done in a design by the architect before they even come to you to make it easier for you and for the whole process?

Are you asking from like more of a design perspective or are asking more from a information perspective? Well, I'm asking from a design perspective, but I guess, I guess, if you have anything else, any other information from an information perspective, more of a design, like, you know, passive solar, for example, you know, is what, what's your comments on that when it comes to architectural designs?

not just your average volume builder where passive solar design, you know, is it works, it works more efficiently.

Not really. I don't really have anything sort of off the top of my head that we probably haven't all heard before. You know, with the North Glass and Living Space to the North and try and keep all your utilities to the southwest and those kinds of things. Not every site has the ability to do that. And so often what I say to architects is...

find out what is important to the homeowner. Is that the feeling of comfort throughout the year? Is that the feeling of resilience over time in terms of sort of independence from the grid, know, self-reliance instead of being reliant on the grid and all the fluctuations we have to deal with and ongoing increases to energy costs? Or is health the most important? Those things actually really drive

project outcomes. Because then when you come to an energy efficiency consultant with an understanding of those things, it's far easier to then manipulate those specifications and what's actually going on in these different rooms, because the data we actually can pull out of the NatHERS model is pretty immense. And being able to distill that down into like, okay, well, you came to me and you wanted a house that sits between 21 and 26 degrees, we've been able to optimize that to, okay, 60%.

and at the time it's sitting in that temperature range. Wow, okay well the specs to get us there actually take us beyond seven stars to begin with and get us to 7.5 or 7.6 or 8.2. Then they're able to rationalize those costs and be like okay well for us to get to that level this is what we're gonna have to pay in a premium over the top of seven stars. So you can start to actually make that cost benefit analysis.

It's almost like you're driving a car with your eyes closed in the previous way we've been doing things. You just don't know until, okay, well, we need an energy report for compliance. Let's get one. all of a sudden I've got to spend an extra 50 grand just to get to seven stars when I didn't even know that was a thing six months ago. So I didn't answer your question directly. No, think that was still a really good answer. Indirectly. Because I think we're all well aware of those.

aspirations when it comes from a design perspective, but yeah, like I said, like it's often not always the case that we can get those on a site. And that's where the architect of is obviously crafting a brief, usually from their client. And the answer is what the answer is sometimes. And so, yeah, having that early engagement means that you don't have to.

change the design to suit the requirements. You know there's a graph somewhere I've never been able to find this graph but it's such a good graph maybe I'll have to do the research on it at some point but they showed sort of like the impact of glass depending on how low

star rating you have. So if you if you're a six stars getting to seven wasn't a big jump in the glass because you already have a six star home but when you get lower in the star ratings that glass can only take you so far and often if you're a low star rating even if you had the best windows in the entire world in terms of u-values and the appropriate SHGCs

you are not getting to seven stars because that design just can't get there even with the best windows in the world and that's what we've relied on in the past when we do those energy reports at the end is all glass it's like okay well the only lever I have is what value windows we use

that's just not going to happen in the new code and with seven stars. yeah, getting your design optimised early is just the best way and letting the software do that is usually the best outcome as well.

You're in your business, you're talking a lot about the clients and the people who are going to be living in the house and you have created a business around human-centered solutions. And I think that that is definitely an element that has been missing in the energy consulting sphere.

Yeah, there's a really good TED talk, I think on architecture. I think I heard it. Is it the one about the guy with about the placement of the bathroom? Yeah, that one. So I watched this like maybe seven, eight years ago or something and it stuck with me forever. for those who don't know what we're talking about here, there is a Ted talk out there. Maybe we should try and find it. A link it in your show notes. There's a TED talk of an

who grew up in this house where the bathroom was not near the bedrooms and he had to get to the bathroom you had to walk across this landing which overlooked the living spaces below and so every time you wanted to get to the bar like you know he had a shower you wanted to get you to your room you would have he would have to run across the landing and he developed like a

just gone off my head, sort of self consciousness about his body and who he is as a person because every time he ran back, had to like sort of run back and you he didn't like obviously how he felt like being seen exposed. so that has always stuck with me because like architecture is about the human. It's like the only reason we have architecture is because of the way we interact with spaces.

And yeah, I'm trying to bring that back into energy efficiency where the energy efficiency consultant is a conduit for better lifestyles and a better environment in the house and to help the architect achieve better outcomes in that way.

I don't want to do that by changing the design that they've worked hard on because they're the architect at the end of the day. It's like, how can we actually work together to get the best outcomes? The best outcomes are ones where they're driven by the homeowner and the homeowner has buy-in rather than us together as the architect and the consultant doing all these things that then we translate over to the homeowner. It just doesn't mean anything to them. So I'm trying to bridge that gap.

I that. What was I going to say? I was going to say,

As humans, we judge our surroundings by how they make us feel, you know? And I don't know how many times I had phone calls from people after they'd moved into the house and they'd say to me, I thought this house was energy efficient or it's cold or they've compromised on a specification due to budget and then not thought about how they're actually going to feel when they're inside their home.

I think that your sort of your attitude towards bringing the homeowner into the process is I don't think I've come across it before in the energy space because we sit behind a desk with a computer program in front of us and it's not really conducive to thinking about what's going to happen down the track. That's right. Yeah. One of my values is treat

treating the project like I'm actually going to live in it. Because it's like, I want to love to live in the house I'm working on. That's what drives me. Yeah, yeah. Makes sense. like that.

So

We have lot of, know, housing costs are increasing, mortgages are increasing, housing prices, everything's going up. And there's a upsurge in renovations and retrofits in the residential market at the moment. So could you discuss a little bit about that and how your work fits in with that shift in the market?

I don't know the exact numbers on this but probably one in every two or three projects I get is an Alteration Addition So yes they're growing in popularity in a number. They tend to all follow a very similar pattern which is old is cold and new is nice and warm and

Bridging that gap between the two can be challenging and tricky. I love actually working on those projects. They tend to be, you know, a beautiful old cottage and a really nice extension that I'm usually pretty stoked to have the opportunity to work on.

Those projects as well are doing an unbelievable job for sustainability as well because we're reusing old building stock and so all the embodied carbon and that component of which doesn't get discussed in sort of wider circles is really important as well but as I said old is cold and new is nice and warm that doesn't always translate to the best star rating outcomes and so there is a compliance

pathway there that needs to be discovered as early as possible because again those ones you just cannot leave to the end. They're usually going to be the hardest ones to get through. So there is a few developments. So here in South Australia we've got Ministerial Building Standard 013 and then we've actually got the NatHERS scheme for existing homes.

which is a whole new version of star ratings and NatHERS that is focused purely on existing homes. Is that new? Did you say it is a new thing? How new? So they're opening it up for testing. Like so assessors can become a beta tester in a way. I haven't applied for it yet. I probably will apply for it.

With that being said, actually don't have a lot of information on it simply because I didn't go to the webinar that they held for me. However, with that being said, I think it's going to be a really important part of the future, especially with mandatory disclosures potentially coming in where, okay, I'm going to go buy a house and the real estate agent or the current homeowner will have to disclose its energy rating.

That is where that existing homes will probably play a big role in that like, I'm not even doing an extension or alteration. I just need to get an energy assessment on my house so I can sell it. That's where that existing home is likely going to play. It'll be important to know where it plays in sort of the alterations additions component.

MBS 013, which is the South Australian government proposal provision for these alterations editions is a very interesting document. So there's like whole new DTS, basically specification that you follow for the alteration Addition part. I'm still working it out.

The other thing as well is they brought in NatHER star ratings for alterations additions where if your extension of habitable spaces is less than 50 % in area, then you can have a discounted star rating. Anything above 50%, you either have to follow the NCC or you follow their DTS specs. So that's interesting. I went back and calculated a few projects I've had come across my desk and all of those are beyond 50%.

So how those will get assessed and treated.

is something that's developing that gets kicked in May in 2025. Right. Okay. So that's going to be interesting one, something I'm learning about as we speak. I'd say a lot of renovations would fall into that category because you have like a, you know, a two to three bedroom cottage with a kitchen. Yeah. It's not very big. A big beautiful extension out the back. I always advocate for NatHERS first and using NatHERS as a way to inform again, how the building is going to feel for you. Where are those problem areas?

Do you get any benefit from insulating the existing timber timber floors usually usually suspended timber floors Do you get any benefit from insulating the roof like we've discussed on a previous project? Can you do new to old like you could previously under this new note? You apply the new building fabric to the existing so with that you can only ever do the glass because you can't change an existing homes walls from 300 mm stone to

lightweight 140mm timber frames, which is usually what the extension is. Whereas if both buildings are brick veneer, you can then apply the insulation to the old part, even though they may not do that in the future.

So on the ones I've typically worked with, they're 300 mm stone, you know, old blue cottages, blue stone cottages, and you can't quite do that with those. So we tend to, we tend to use NatHERS first to inform the actual spec and then we use the deem to satisfy compliance requirements. And usually you smash those out of the park because you've already done NatHERS to inform the spec and then use the compliance pathway available in the NCC to actually get it through.

And usually you don't struggle with that because you've done all the hard work to begin with. So that's usually how I've approached the alterations additions. think it's the again, what is the most human centered way of doing it? Because yet those old buildings are cold, how can we make them a little bit warmer?

without introducing all the other risks associated with going higher energy efficiency. What can we do within reason? Is it worth replacing the windows? Usually you can find that out through a NatHERS report and actually get the insights for that.

Ben, if you could explain the energy efficiency compliance pathways to someone who didn't know anything about it, how would you summarize that?

So the National Construction Code, part 13.2 is your energy efficiency requirements. In that, there's lots of minimum requirements that you have to meet in order for your building to be compliant. That is what we call deem to satisfy or elemental provisions. And you go through that code document.

and you say, do I achieve this minimum requirement? If I don't, what do I have to change in order for us, for myself to meet that minimum requirement? That is deemed to satisfy Usually there's a few Excel spreadsheets that help you prove your compliance, namely for glass and windows.

If you don't achieve the green little tick in the bottom right, then you have to change your specifications in order to meet, in order to generate that little green tick in the bottom right. That is all you get. You get a little green tick and that's it.

And that's for the glazing is separate. The windows are separate, isn't it? Yeah. So the windows forms a part of that part 13.2 code requirement. And so you go through walls, you go through floors, roofs, glass, know, skylights, things like that. So you go through each of these components and you just say, okay, do I meet this requirement? Yes. If I do great thumbs up. If I don't, then I have to change something and meet it. Now that is the elemental provision process. And that's

your first pathway available to you that is what we call minimum requirements. There's no data that you get out of that you just get a green tick in most cases. The second option is your NatHERS star rating.

That is, again, what I call the more human centered approach where we assess a house based on all the components actually interacting together. So your walls and your windows work together as a team with your roofs, your floors, your ceilings and all of that. It's true, right? They all work together. No, no, I'm not laughing. Every time I hear wall to the window, I think of that song. To the sweat drives down my balls

didn't mean to interrupt you, just help it. From the walls to the windows. From the windows to the walls. So you have to listen to that song when you're at home. Anyway, that's funny. So where were we?

The other option, which I call the more human centered approach, full of data, full of insights is your NatHERS assessment.

and that NatHERS whole of home as well.

This is where all the building components such as your walls, roofs, floors, windows work together as a team.

in order to encapsulate you from the environment outside. And so how well those components perform and then add them together is what you get out of a NatHERS assessment, where we're modeling heat flows through these different spaces, through walls, through your roofs, and ventilation as well, how all of these different spaces interact with each other.

That's a NatHERS assessment. Sounds a lot more complicated than a deemed to satisfy tick of the box assessment. And that's true. And what does NatHERS stand for? What does that mean? National House Energy Rating Scheme. Okay. And that's the star rating. That is the star rating. Yes. Yes. And so we import a set of plans. We do some drawing over those plans. We assign zones. You know, we put in window details. We put in the floor constructions, all of these different details, data entry in a way. And we pull all of that

together shading, neighboring dwellings, know obstructions, wind flow from outside to inside. We assess all of those different components and because of that you're actually able to understand what the building is actually doing internally and how you can expect it to behave over the course of a year. There's tons of different, 69 climate zones in Australia for NatHERS climates.

microclimates across the country that have an influence on where the building is. So a building that performs pretty well in Adelaide might not perform very well in Queensland and so you would adjust the building and the design and the specifications to accommodate for these different areas in the country. And so because of that there's an underlying calculation engine that's quite complicated by the CSIRO.

called Cheneath doesn't really matter to our conversation, but it's there. And because of that calculation engine, we get hourly data points for every hour in the year about, okay, this room is actually at 32 degrees in, you know, four o'clock on a Sunday, you know, in summer. Well, that's not great. So now we need heating, or sorry, we need cooling to bring that room into a comfortable temperature range. And that's what generates your heating and cooling loads requirements.

you need to be under a certain number for compliance outcomes. And so because of that, we're able to measure, what energy is required in different rooms, how much is used, and how often are you gonna be using it? And because of that, we get all of that data portrayed to us in our system. The job of the energy efficiency consultant is to take that data out

and communicate it to your design team and your architect or the homeowner and illustrate what's actually happening in the house so that they can go away and make some decisions about how they want their house to be in the field and to perform. I love doing that. Love taking the data out, assessing it, understanding it, visualising it and sharing that with clients. One of the most recent projects.

was so clear the benefit of going to these higher star ratings that it just was a no brainer for the client to be like, we're gonna take up basically all your suggestions except for a few that we just don't like. No worries, that's great. So you might go from eight stars, which is what we maxed it out at to 7.5. That's fantastic. That's a great, that's a balanced outcome that you're gonna be happy with long term that you've had the power to actually go away and choose.

You don't get that from a green tick DTS assessment. So those are the two pathways that you have available to you to prove your minimum compliance. used to be six stars. Now it's seven stars, but you can go beyond. There is 10 stars you can achieve. You can go as far as you can really. I'd probably never say go to 10 stars. It probably doesn't make too much sense, but you can if you really wanted to. Nine stars is fantastic outcome. Eight stars is probably the sweet spot. Seven stars and above is always good as well.

It depends on the context, the project, the design. The homeowner is what they actually want to get out of it. But having said that, there's another compliance requirement, which is your whole of home. That is separate to your star ratings. It is all about the energy usage. So what's your heating system? What's your cooling system?

What's your hot water system? Do you have solar on the house? Are you implementing a battery? Do you have a pool? What pool pump are you using? So the star rating tends to focus on thermal fabric and that envelope that's keeping you from either freezing or being too hot from outside. Whole of home is all about energy usage. And so we now have a really good picture of how this house is both performing from a thermal perspective, but also energy, energy wise, what's actually going on, how effective is

solar, how effective is the battery, and you can actually start to again, layer these bits of data and paint a picture of what the F is going on in that house.

Was there a third one? was that whole of home the third option or is there another one? No, so whole of home definitely forms both parts. So if you go to the DTS, deemed to satisfy pathway, you still need to do a whole of home. Okay. So that's on top of DTS and on top of a star rating. it's a whole new compliance requirement for energy efficiency. Okay. You have to have both of those. The third option is verification. I'm not a verification expert.

So I don't tend to offer these, I don't tend to really talk about them a lot. They are a third option. It's usually reserved for if you don't pass DTS specs, you don't really pass the star rating. Can we get it through a verification assessment? However, in the current NCC 2022 7-star era, I've heard from others that the verification pathway is a lot more balanced in comparison to previous codes.

So it is, I would say it comes down to a code pathway. If you've got a building that is very irregular and different, maybe verification would be the best pathway for that.

Yeah, I don't have the best it's generally a mix of the DTS and verification. You use both in tandem and you sort of forget about the star rating and you're sort of focused on those two. But yeah, usually it's reserved for those trickier projects that just don't quite pass the other two compliance pathways and you have a performance solution. So essentially you're proving that the building is performant, even though it goes against the code minimum requirements and limitations that's there. Yeah, I did a lot of verification.

assessments when I was an energy assessor. And it was really easy to get a verification assessment passed under previous codes.

But it's not so easy now, as I understand it, requirements for a verification assessment are a lot harder. So it's not a go-to assessment anymore, whereas it used to be the one that was easiest to just slap on the end of a design process and just get your certificate and move on. That's right. Yeah. I think when you apply the human-centered approach that I take, it's like, okay, which of these pathways is going to get me that? Usually it's a NatHERS first approach. We take the NatHERS, okay, well, let's...

what we can do, what we can't do. And if we need to, we fall back onto the Deemed to Satisfy, generally for those alterations and addition projects that, you know, okay, you started off at 3 stars, but you can get it to 6.5. Getting it to 7 is just cost prohibitive. Okay, we'll fall back on DTS. At least we've gotten it to 6.5. It's far better than a 3.3 star home. So in general, like you're getting a better outcome, but it's like the compliance requirements, you can just tick a box in the background and not worry too much about that.

How that all sort of moves forward with the sort of yeah change since you see 2022 7 stars alterations additions We're gonna we're really gonna find out over the next 12 months what's going on and maybe a little bit beyond that as well and how that sort of game is gonna play out a little bit more.

Obviously I'm I want to see Nat HERS get better quicker. I'm an impatient person by nature and so

I want all these things tomorrow. It's probably not going to happen. So that's one thing I wish they could move a little bit faster, but it's government.

You've been working in this space a little while now. You've seen a few different facets of the industry. If there was one thing that you could change in an area of building code policy or energy standards that you could change, what would that be?

Never been asked that question before. It's a great question. I'm buying time to think of my answer. No, I have probably two main ones. The implementation of the Ministerial's Building Standard 013 looks fantastic. I think it's going to be a really good thing.

bringing across the Victorian sort of star rating formula for alterations additions is really good because yeah, like I was saying before, like those projects that you get from 3.3 to 6.5, there should be some benefit to doing that and just being able to issue a star rating certificate for that. So the way Victorians have been doing alterations additions for a while now is they have a star rating discount formula where you assess the existing building before

the changes and then you assess the building after or you say okay well the star rating compliance requirement is seven the current building is getting three point three

You then plug it into a formula with all the different areas and all the different areas of work and new work and all this stuff. And it gives you a star rating discount. So instead of having to get it to seven, you might only have to get it to five and a half, which means going from 3.3 to six and a half means you've not only smashed that discounted compliance requirement, but you've shown like, okay, well, wow, 3.3 to 6.5, absolutely fantastic. And I can just issue a star rating certificate.

I think what's limiting with the way we've implemented, potentially being implemented here in SA is we just got a blanket 50%. Like if you're over 50%, you can't use that discount. I don't know why we've done that. Why can't it just be any size home? don't, I don't quite understand the 50%. If there's a rationale or a reason behind it, I'd love to know. It doesn't quite say it in the document. It's just an arbitrary 50 % from what I can see. And unfortunately, if you're over that 50 % level, like you just have to follow

code again so it's like how can we maybe make that better there should be maybe a different formula if you're over 50 percent at least then you can use star rating so that's probably the major one that i've recently come across is I think that could be done better

I I missed the feedback period for that one. That was like six months ago. I didn't even know about it. I never got an email. Someone who practices in this space every day doesn't get asked. So I don't know if there's any other colleagues out there that have been asked. I never got any emails for that. So that's it just goes out to the public. Like it goes out to a mailing list. You don't get selected. Yeah, I must not have been on the mailing list, I suppose. that one's that one's a...

I I was able to give the feedback. But anyway, it is what it is, so we'll just work with it. The other one as well is I love what NatHERS can do and I love the potential and capability that it has. I wish it could be quicker in iterating. I'm an impatient person by nature. I want to see people living in healthy, comfortable, resilient homes.

And think that is a great pathway to doing that for most projects. Obviously, we haven't talked about passive house. That's another fantastic approach as well.

I would love to see Nat HERS develop that further and really, I think, know, programs like Hero and what Nick Bishop is doing over there Hero already take Nat HERS really far. I think there's just so many good things that can come out of pushing it as far forward as we can and making it better as well.

Okay. Well, thank you so much, Ben. I think I really, I really enjoyed all of your insights today. I've been out of the energy space for a few years now. So I enjoy hearing about where it's gone since I left. And I particularly enjoy hearing where you're taking it because I think that you have a very, very holistic and very warm.

and a very helpful attitude towards energy. Whereas I try my very best every day. I love the feedback. Yeah, I know you do. It's obvious. So I appreciate your time. Thank you very much for joining me.