David Pickles

This guidance is for anyone who wishes to improve energy efficiency in an historic building. There are many reasons to do this. Improving energy efficiency will lower carbon emissions and fuel bills and often increase comfort. It also might be necessary to ensure that a building complies with legal requirements. More broadly, improving energy efficiency forms a part of the wider objective to achieve a sustainable environment. It is a widely held view that older buildings are not energy-efficient, and must be radically upgraded in order to improve their performance. In reality, the situation is more complicated, and assumptions about poor performance are not always justified. Even so, the energy and carbon performance of most historic buildings can be improved, which will help them remain viable and useful, now and in the future. But striking the right balance between benefit and harm is not easy. The unintended consequences of getting energy efficiency measures wrong (or doing them badly) include: harm to heritage values and significance, harm to human health and building fabric, and failure to achieve the predicted savings or reductions in environmental impact. Getting the balance right (and avoiding unintended consequences) is best done with a holistic approach that uses an understanding of a building, its context, its significance, and all the factors affecting energy use as the starting point for devising an energy-efficiency strategy. This ‘whole building approach’ ensures that energy-efficiency measures are suitable, robust, well integrated, properly coordinated and sustainable. In addition, this approach provides an effective framework for communication and understanding between the various parties involved in the process. These include assessors, designers, installers and the people who occupy and manage the building. A logical and systematic process of energy planning underpins the ‘whole building approach’. This guidance describes the key stages of the process, illuminating any problems that might occur and providing solutions. It also includes checklists of practical measures that might be considered, along with links to sources of more detailed information about how to install these measures.

When historic buildings are left vacant they are at a greatly increased risk of damage and decay as well as being a potential blight on their locality. The best way to protect a building is to keep it occupied, even if the use is on a temporary or partial basis. It is inevitable that some historic buildings will struggle to find any use, especially in areas where the property market is weak and the opportunities for sale or re-use are limited. However, such buildings may become centrepieces of future regeneration and safeguarding will allow them to fulfil their social, cultural and economic potential. This guidance is intended to help owners and purchasers of vacant historic buildings to reduce the risks by undertaking a range of precautionary measures and adopting an ‘active management’ approach that can prevent unnecessary damage, dereliction and loss of historic fabric. Owners will also benefit by maintaining the value of their assets and increasing the chances of bringing them back into permanent use. The guidance explains how to decommission buildings that are about to be vacated, as well as how to look after buildings that have already been vacant for some time.

Traditional farmsteads and farm buildings make an important contribution to the remarkably varied character of England’s landscape. They are fundamental to its sense of place and local distinctiveness. Although the majority of traditional farm buildings have now become partly or wholly redundant for modern agricultural purposes unsupported by income to fund their maintenance and repair, they often have the potential to be of economic value in terms of their capacity to accommodate a variety of new uses. Successful adaptive reuse of any farmstead or building depends upon an understanding of its significance, its relationship to the wider landscape setting and its sensitivity to and capacity for change. This advice is aimed at owners of farm buildings, building professionals and local authority planning and conservation officers. It explains how significance can be retained and enhanced through well-informed maintenance and sympathetic development, provided that repairs, design and implementation are carried out to a high standard. This replaces The Conversion of Traditional Farm Buildings published September 2006.

The appearance of brick and stone masonry owes as much to the character of the mortar joints as to the stone and bricks themselves. Unsuitable repointing can affect not only the look but also the durability of masonry, and is amongst the most frequent causes of damage to the character and fabric of historic buildings. The comprehensive repointing of a building is rarely necessary. Generally only those parts that are most exposed to the weather or are affected by specific problems such as leaking rainwater pipes or gutters are likely to be in need of attention. Sound historic mortar should be left undisturbed as it can be an important part of the character and significance of a building. This guidance, aimed at homeowners and non-specialist building professionals, provides a brief technical guide to the key issues and stages that need to be considered when repointing brick or stone walls of older buildings.