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Webinar Description:
The latest BusinessGreen Webinar will explore how efforts to accelerate the roll out of green building retrofits and slash emissions from existing buildings are advancing, providing unique insights into how organisations have successfully cut emissions across their properties.Hosted in association with Equans, a leading provider of energy services, this free and interactive webinar will bring together experts from across the building and energy efficiency sectors to provide real world advice on how to successfully deliver green retrofit projects and maximise the resulting cost, emissions, productivity, and health benefits.
The session will provide an exclusive insight into a series of cutting-edge projects in north-east England, which are slashing emissions and energy costs from public buildings and social housing projects, saving taxpayers money and providing a best practice template for other public and private sector organisations to follow.
“Thousands of companies and public sector organisations have set ambitious net zero targets that will require them to retrofit their existing buildings to enhance their energy efficiency and sharply reduce their emissions,” said BusinessGreen editor-in-chief James Murray. “But relatively few organisations have translated these targets into projects that can deliver on the ground.
This invaluable webinar will provide exclusive in-depth insights into projects that are demonstrating how ambitious deep retrofit projects can be successfully executed, unlocking multiple environmental and financial benefits in the process.”
Panellists
James Murray is Editor-in-Chief of BusinessGreen, having launched the site in October 2007. He is responsible for BusinessGreen's leading news, opinion and analysis, and also contributes to the brand's expanding events' programme. James is one of the UK's leading commentators on the low carbon economy. He writes occasionally for The Guardian newspaper and has also reported for BBC Radio on a number of green technology stories. James reports daily on a wide range of green business issues, with a particular focus on low carbon policy, economics and technology. In March 2011, James was voted number eight in the Press Gazette's list of the top 50 environmental journalists in the UK. Prior to launching BusinessGreen, James spent five years as a technology journalist working on a variety of IT titles.
Tim Rippon is a Senior Climate Change Specialist at Newcastle City Council, working on the delivery of the city’s Net Zero 2030 commitment.
Tim has been Project Director for Newcastle City Council’s deployment of heat pumps and heat networks to approximately 32 non-domestic buildings across the city over the past year as part of a £27 million capital programme of energy efficiency and decarbonisation works. This project includes heat pumps being incorporated as the primary heating system for a range of buildings such as swimming pools, dry leisure centres, libraries, large office blocks, schools, industrial units, cultural heritage buildings including Grade 1 listed buildings, among others.
Newcastle City Council has also been at the forefront of heat pump deployment into both domestic and non-domestic properties, having been one of the three locations in the country for the Department of Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) Electrification of Heat pilot programme which saw 300 heat pumps deployed into a wide range of residential property types and tenures over the past year. And Newcastle is one of the cities that BEIS has selected for the Heat Network Zoning pilot project.
• BA Economics and Law
• CIPs Level 6
• CHE - Law
• Six Sigma – Green
Tim has a wealth of experience working on both client and contractor roles from his time at Home Group, Gentoo and Kier. Tim has also spent 12 years in consumer electronics manufacturing mainly in commercial and quality management roles. Tim is a qualified Six Sigma Green Belt practitioner.
Tim heads our Sustainability & Innovation Team which delivers several exciting, market-leading new projects in the areas of climate change, carbon foot printing and neutrality, as well as net zero developments. Tim has managed and lead and supported the following projects:
• EQUANS Social Housing Demonstrator Project
• EQUANS Wave 1 & 2 SHDF schemes (including LAD funded schemes)
• EQUANS Decarbonisation of 11 tower blocks utilising ASHP & GSHP
• EQUANS PSDS 1 & 3 Applications
• Kier Services Smart Property Strategy & Statutory Compliance
• Lead sustainability for the BRE/Oxford Brooks University, Code for Sustainable Homes 2012
Keith has been working in Carbon Management for over fifteen years, working in local authorities before becoming Carbon Manager at Northumbria University in 2015.
As well as managing the day-to-day utilities contracts, Keith’s role is to develop and deliver the University’s Carbon Management Strategy, which aims to be net zero carbon by no later than 2040. Since 2015 the University has reduced carbon emissions by 60%. This has mainly been achieved through energy efficiency projects, such as BMS improvements, upgrading AHUs and LED Lighting and controls, which have resulted in a 22% reduction in gas consumption and 30% reduction in electricity consumption. Keith is currently working on the University’s strategy to decarbonise heat across the Campus.
Heather Buchanan is the co-founder of Bankers for Net Zero, an initiative that brings together banks, businesses and regulators to support the financial sectors transition to net zero in the UK. In April 2021, at the launch of the Glasgow Financial Alliance for Net Zero (GFANZ), Bankers for Net Zero was announced to lead the UK Country Chapter of the UN Convened Net Zero Banking Alliance, the first initiative of its kind in the world. The focus of the Bankers for Net Zero is strategic policy alignment. By creating clarity on which areas of the net zero transition require policies which can optimise the contribution banks can make to the real economy, Bankers for Net Zero enables both policymakers and banks to play their part in accelerating the transition to net zero.
Alongside this work, she is the Director of Policy for the APPG on Fair Business Banking where she sets the strategic focus of the group and has 7 years’ worth of experience successfully working in UK Parliament, regularly advising MPs, peers, Government departments, regulators, trade bodies and civil society on the commercial relationships between businesses and their lenders.
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