Climate change

2030 Vision: All buildings in Waltham Forest are energy efficient, making them affordable, comfortable and adaptable to the changing climate.  

Overview 

Key target: 80% of homes in Waltham Forest have achieved an EPC level of B or higher by 2030. 

Key Disruption for Climate Justice: Retrofits for all fuel-poor homes across the borough. Providing targeted support to retrofit households that are living in fuel poverty across the borough can help to reduce energy bills and be a first step to lifting families out of fuel poverty. This will involve large capital changes (for example, new heating systems, and new wall insulation) but we can start with lower-cost changes (draught proofing, LED bulbs) that can be introduced quickly and help lower people’s bills quickly. 

• Action 1: Launch a retrofit loan for homes. To help households act sooner, we will launch a zero or low-interest loan, focused on retrofitting to improve the energy efficiency of buildings, such as insulation and double glazing.  

• Action 2: Create a Waltham Forest Retrofit Company. To develop the skills, approaches and techniques to provide great quality and value retrofits across the borough, cater to the increasing demand with confidence and develop training and employment opportunities for local residents.  

• Action 3: Encourage quick-win energy improvements for households. Helping households to improve energy efficiency, such as providing energy ‘MOTs’ to pinpoint the best actions to improve the performance of a house, or through a ‘DIY insulation challenge’ to create a movement around making this low-complexity, high return improvements that can help lower energy bills quickly. 

• Action 4: Provide tailored support for the top 20 business carbon emitters in the borough. The high share of small and medium enterprises (SMEs) across the borough can make addressing emissions a challenge due to the distribution of emissions sources. ​We will provide targeted support to the top emitting organisations in the borough to help reduce their emissions through energy efficiency and other measures.  We recognise this is a small share of businesses, so we will then provide a network to share experiences and ideas, often the best champions will be other businesses themselves.  

• Action 5: Build like it’s 2030: go further on the standards of our own developments. We’ve made great progress in improving the energy efficiency of buildings in the borough, but we need to go further. We commit that all our new developments will be built to an even higher standard (such as BREEAM Excellent) or commit to specific measures (like no gas boilers, and always triple glazing). 

As a Council, we are responsible for many buildings and areas of land across the borough, which themselves can be a source of carbon emissions. We have a great opportunity to make the most of these assets, making them as energy efficient as possible and showcase the range of tools, techniques and technologies that can be used.  

• Council Leadership: Retrofit all Council-owned, occupied or developed buildings to an average of EPC level B or higher by 2030. We will improve the energy efficiency of each of our buildings to make sure they are compatible with a net zero future, such as improving double or triple glazing, adding insulation, and more.  

• Council Leadership: Install solar panels on all viable Council-owned buildings by 2030. The rooftops of our buildings could be great places to generate renewable energy. We will carry out a feasibility study to understand which are the most viable to install solar panels.