CC Jul-Aug 2020

INDUSTRY news
THE HEAT IS ON FOR GREEN HOME GRANTS
Using a high-tech thermal
imaging camera to measure
heat loss from roofs,
Bluesky International is helping
to identify poorly insulated
homes and other public buildings.
The property level heat
loss maps provide an accurate
and up-to-date picture that
could be used to pinpoint
homes eligible for financial support
such as the UK Government’s
Green Homes Grants.
The Chancellor recently
announced a package of
grants worth a total £2 billion
for energy-efficient home
improvements, including
installing insulation, double
glazing and replacing old boilers.
The remaining £1 billion will
be spent making public buildings
including schools and
hospitals more environmentally
friendly, with £50 million going
towards retrofitting social housing
with insulation, double glazing
and heat pumps.
"The government announcement
of support for homeowners
to improve the energy efficiency
of their homes as part of
a wider green jobs package
brings thermal surveys to the
forefront," commented Rachel
Tidmarsh, MD of Bluesky International.
"The intelligence we
can derive from a thermal
image can help target this
money highlighting at a glance
properties that would benefit
from additional insulation and
double glazing."
www.bluesky-world.com
ACTIVE HEARING PROTECTION MANDATE
Galliford Try's Highways business
has implemented a
new mandate requiring all of its
sites to adopt Active Hearing
Protection from July. The measure
will become part of the
business's standard PPE
requirements to try and clamp
down on noise induced hearing
loss (NIHL), which is the most
commonly reported occupational
disease in Europe.
Highways has adopted smart
tech company Eave's Active Ear
Defenders, which use a best-inclass
'hear through' technology.
Unlike standard passive ear
defenders, the Eave solution
allows the wearer to continue to
hear environmental sound, vastly
improving the safety of workers.
The unique highways work
setting makes it more imperative
for operatives to be constantly
aware of ambient noise,
while also protecting themselves.
The smart headsets also
monitor and map noise exposure,
displaying it via a cloudbased
software platform, allowing
the business to analyse in
real time each worker's noise
exposure across a site.
www.eave.io
£2BN GREEN ENERGY BLACKOUT BILL FOR UK
The Global Warming Policy
Foundation (GWPF) has
published a collection of papers
by energy expert Dr John Constable,
documenting the rapid
decay of the UK electricity system,
with system balancing
costs spiralling out of control in
june. The cost of balancing the
grid over the last Bank Holiday
weekend amounted to £50m,
and National Grid has predicted
additional costs of £700m from
May to August alone. It has
taken desperate measures in an
attempt to reduce the bill, but
according to expert observers,
these may well prove futile.
GB system balancing costs
have been rising sharply over
recent decades, as inflexible
3D Repo are working on a
solution that will significantly
improve remote working in the
AEC industry by replacing
screen sharing with distant 3D
navigationand could see ~million-times
reduction in internet
bandwidth and latency
demands.The innovative idea
comes after the recent lockdown
uncovered new problems
for remote working and BIM
coordination.
Work on the project started in
June after recently winning
funding from Innovate UK, the
UK's innovation agency, in a
competition which aims to fasttrack
the development of innovations
borne out of the coronavirus
crisis whilst supporting
cutting-edge UK start-ups. The
competition is also part of a
larger £40 million government
investment to drive forward new
technological advances.
Choppy audio and video while
teleconferencing during lockdown
has agitated many professionals
working from home
renewables have taken a leading
role in electricity supply, driven
by £10 billion a year of subsidies
and price-fixing arrangements.
In 2002 system balancing
cost £367m, but by 2019 it
had risen to just under £1.5bn,
a level that was expected to be
sustained this year. However,
because wind and solar can’t
respond to the low demand
caused by lockdown, National
Grid now expects the total to be
about £2bn, and even that figure
is based on the assumption
that costs return to normal after
August. If the lockdown runs on
into the autumn, the cost could
easily rise by hundreds of millions
more.
https://bit.ly/2Zmbi7K
DISTANT 3D NAVIGATION FOR AEC WORKERS
during the pandemic. Adding
3D rendering into the mix
makes screen sharing in AEC
virtually impossible. Head of
Construction at Innovate UK,
Simon Hart, said: "3D Repo has
quickly responded to new implications
brought to light by the
COVID-19 pandemic. Their
innovative solution has the
capacity to significantly improve
the remote working experience
for AEC professionals while at
the same time speeding up the
internet for everyone else."
The solution will rely on remote
3D rendering and navigation
sharing. Each user will be able
to instantly become a presenter
in 3D space with avatars denoting,
in real-time, who is working
on what at any given location.
Instead of screen sharing, a
domain-specific remote rendering
solution based on the 3D
Repo Digital Construction Platform
in the cloud will be used,
with navigation updates
exchanged in real-time.
https://3drepo.com
8
July/August 2020