Scotland looks to adopt Scandinavian energy standards

Climate-change minister in Scotland, Stewart Stevenson, wants to see new houses in Scotland meet Scandinavian standards, enabling householders to significantly reduce their energy user and bills. To investigate the possibility, an expert panel to recommend measures to make houses and buildings in Scotland more energy efficient has been set up. It will bring together designers, developers, contractors, assessors and researchers with experts from Norway, Denmark and Austria, who have experience on energy standards in their home countries. Mr Stevenson said, ‘Scotland already leads in the UK in both the energy standards set by our building regulations and the planning policy that asks for low and zero-carbon equipment in new developments, but there is much more that can be done. ‘We need to work with industry to make sure that the targets set are realistic, so it can develop skills and technologies that will deliver improvements to buildings. ‘I am asking the expert panel to develop a strategy that will allow us to set targets to deliver even greater energy efficiency in our buildings and ensure that more buildings can generate their own energy.’