Page 4706 - Week 11 - Wednesday, 20 October 2010
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being built in Canberra. A lot of them are still not being built like this. They are not facing north. They face the street. Passive solar design is unfortunately not prioritised by the building industry sufficiently at present. That is why it is appropriate that the government has introduced the territory plan variations it has. I will now speak a little about the draft territory plan variation 301 and 303 which both contain measures for improving solar access and passive solar design.
Draft variation 301 covers residential block layout. It mandates that 95 per cent of blocks must be such that they, in effect, make passive solar design very easy—all but compulsory. They make it so that the builders do not even have to think about it. The easiest place to put the house will be such that it will have a good northern face and will get passive solar design by default, not because they had to particularly think about it.
Good block design makes passive solar design cheap and easy. Good block design and good block layout make achieving six stars for energy efficiency rating, which is now the requirement in the ACT, or in the future seven or eight stars, easy and cost effective. If we persist in having blocks which do not face north, yes, the people who are concerned about energy efficiency are correct to say that there are potentially cost imposts with highly efficient—
MADAM DEPUTY SPEAKER: Clerk, could you stop the clock for a moment? Ms Le Couteur, could you just sit down for a moment, please? Ms Le Couteur’s voice is quite soft. I am having a great deal of difficulty hearing what she is saying because of the conversations that are happening in the chamber. If you need to have conversations, would you please go outside and have them or could you just lower them a bit, please? I just cannot hear what Ms Le Couteur is saying. Thank you. Start the clock again. Ms Le Couteur.
MS LE COUTEUR: Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. I will also try and speak louder. I was talking about the fact that if we have our block design right then having highly energy efficient houses is cheap and easy to do. But as the building industry has not been doing this, ACTPLA is totally correct to put forward the draft variations that it has as far as the solar access parts are concerned.
Draft variation 303 provides for the concept of a solar fence. What it says is that no block should be overshadowed more than the shadow which would be cast by a fence 1.8 metres high on the boundary of the block. That is actually really important because the lack of guarantee of sun on your block severely discourages people in terms of doing the right thing by solar.
Why would you spend the money on putting PVs on your roof or a solar hot-water system on your roof if you are not assured that you will actually have sun on your roof so that they will work? Why would you bother doing a solar passive design for your house if you think that in a month or two your next-door neighbour’s house will be built and you will lose all your sun? That is what can happen at present and it is addressed in draft variation 303. We think that is very important. The Greens are committed to solar access as a right for house owners and building owners in the ACT.
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