Transform-ER’s Retrofit Rulebook – a living resource for a thriving retrofit ecosystem
Mike Pitts, Deputy Director for Heat and Buildings, Innovate UK
Back in late 2023, the Net Zero Heat team at Innovate UK ran the Net Zero Heat: Design Engineering Innovation Lab with one central belief: the industry already has many of the technical solutions needed to achieve our net-zero goals. What we lack are the tools, frameworks and ways of working to deliver these solutions at the scale, speed and cost required in practice.
To tackle this, we brought together 40 organisations to combine their expertise and generate game-changing ideas for a retrofit industry capable of upgrading one million homes every year by 2030.
Transform-ER – systemic change for systemic challenges
From this five-day lab, the Transform-ER consortium was born: 13 organisations united by decades of experience, a commitment to collaboration and a shared belief that systemic challenges demand systemic change.
Using the Construction Innovation Hub’s Demand–Develop–Deploy model, the team has worked to address the major barriers to scaling retrofit and to build a thriving, resilient ecosystem. Their work includes:
- Demand: Creating digital tools to assess housing portfolios, categorise typologies, aggregate demand and manage retrofit risk.
- Develop: Prototyping new kit-of-parts solutions, defining interoperability standards, and exploring streamlined accreditation processes to meet demand efficiently.
- Deploy: Designing new contracting and procurement models, identifying finance mechanisms, rethinking resident engagement, driving culture change and establishing this Retrofit Rulebook.
Solving the retrofit puzzle – together
The Transform-ER Retrofit Rulebook sets out common rules and guidelines for collaboration across the retrofit sector. It captures what the consortium has learned so far and provides a shared framework for how the many parts of the retrofit ecosystem can work together effectively.
Alongside technical design and installation guidance – especially for interfaces – it addresses several other critical areas for scaling retrofit, including:
- testing and certification of retrofit products
- financing and insuring large-scale projects
- building and managing retrofit pipelines
- adopting digital and AI-driven innovations
- alliancing and collaborative delivery models for Transform-ER’s operating framework.
A starting point for our shared journey
The consortium does not intend for this rulebook to be the final word. It is a starting point – a living resource that will evolve as we all learn, improve and innovate.
There’s no one answer to solving the messy problems of retrofit. But I believe we – as a sector – have the passion, tenacity and expertise to get there. To succeed, we must work together, share openly, and build on each other’s progress.
That’s why I’m so excited to see this rulebook launched – and eager to see how Transform-ER and the wider sector take the next steps on this shared mission.