ABSTRACT
Energy modelling in the UK was still in its infancy, and the domain of very few rather technical people – and almost no architects. Architecture students were generally taught how to calculate U-values, but not given much information on what to do with them. In the early 1990s, Prewett Bizley emerged as a small architecture practice working mainly on one-off housing projects in the UK. The UK Standard Assessment Procedure (SAP) enabled architects to assess energy demand in the domestic sector. Twelve years after first trying SAP, the design process at Prewett Bizley has changed fundamentally. The practice tends to specialise in existing private homes, though they have also taken on social housing projects, and occasional newbuild housing projects too. Prewett Bizley have used Passive House Planning Package (PHPP) for assessing heating and cooling demand, with a general aim of reducing the first and eliminating the need for the second through design.
