According to the BBC, the first house designed to meet level six of the UK’s new Code for Sustainable Homes has been unveiled by Kingspan Offsite. It is insulated to such a high standard that it will lose two thirds less heat than a standard new home. It also features passive ventilation, biomass heating, solar PV and solar hot water.

The Code superseded the Building Research Establishment’s (BRE) Eco-homes Scheme in March 2007. As well as the points system that Eco-homes used, the new Code has minimum energy and water standards for each of its six levels, with level six meaning “carbon neutral”. The Code is currently voluntary and administered by the BRE. Non-residential buildings are still covered by BRE’s BREEAM scheme.

BTW, I’ve put inverted commas around the “first” in the BBC’s title as “earthships” have been around for a long time and they are carbon neutral having no grid connection whatsoever. BEDZED was also intended to be carbon neutral, although some technical problems have been encountered. It is not clear why these two would not meet level 6 – perhaps they simply haven’t been evaluated yet.