Latest news with #ConstructionIndustryCouncil
RNZ News
04-07-2025
- General
- RNZ News
Green housing advocates celebrate no roll back of insulation standards
Photo: 123rf Green housing advocates are celebrating the end of plans to lower insulation standards. Green Building Council head Andrew Eagles said the decision to save the standards meant 30,000 additional whānau would be in healthier, warmer homes each year. RNZ revealed last year that building and construction minister Chris Penk wanted to roll back insulation standards that saved a new home an estimated 40 percent on heating. Some builders had told Penk the new standards had forced up insulation costs by $40,000-$50,000 but he later acknowledged independent advice did not back that up. The Ministry for Business Innovation and Employment has announced there will be no roll back of the standards, however it is removing one of the options for meeting the standards, a "blunt tool" called the schedule method that was adding between $2000 and $15,000 per new home build. Builders will now have to calculate the total effect of windows and other design choices on insulation across the whole home and will no longer have the option of meeting the standards by selecting items individually from an approved list. Insulation had also been blamed for overheating, but research again showed that was incorrect. Eagles said Penk should be congratulated for listening to the science. "I'm really proud to say that Certified Builders, Construction Industry Council, ADNZ (Architectural Designers New Zealand), BRANZ (Building Research Association of New Zealand) and others stepped in and said, no you should not be taking out insulation, and it's bad design that is to blame not insulation for overheating," he said. "It's overglazing, lack of shading and other issues are causing that. "Those insulation levels will stay, and the schedule method is gone. "It (the schedule method) meant that many were using more expensive products than they needed to," Eagles said.
South China Morning Post
10-03-2025
- Business
- South China Morning Post
HK$150 million subsidy allocated for 2,500 graduates in Hong Kong construction
Hong Kong's Construction Industry Council will allocate HK$150 million to subsidise companies training and retaining 2,500 graduates as it remains confident in the sector's future despite a decline in private projects. Advertisement The council, a statutory body representing the construction sector, said on Monday that the scheme is intended to help businesses in difficult times by subsidising consultancy firms and main contractors to train employees who graduated from five professional disciplines. 'The government will boost its capital works expenditure in the coming five years. Despite a declining trend in the private market, I believe we still have a manpower demand and our scheme can take care of the 2,500 graduates,' Albert Cheng Ting-ning, the council's executive director, said. Announced in the annual budget last month, the government will issue bonds to raise funds as it expects the annual capital works expenditure to increase from HK$90 billion to HK$120 billion on average in the coming five financial years. The government will issue bonds to raise funds as it expects the annual capital works expenditure to increase from HK$90 billion to HK$120 billion on average in the coming five financial years. Photo: Dickson Lee In recent years, there has been a lukewarm response from developers in bidding for government land, prompting lay-offs within architectural firms and business loss in some surveying companies. Advertisement The council's scheme, also announced in the budget, targets graduates of engineering, architecture, surveying, planning and landscape architecture disciplines, who are aged 35 or below and have yet to obtain professional qualifications or receive similar subsidies.
