From: Chris Alderson, managing director, Edgetech
When it first appeared, triple glazing was presented as the future. Many thought its rise was inevitable.
But over the last twenty years, that hasn’t happened. The big shift from double to triple never materialised.
In 2014, Edgetech’s Triple Glazing Question sought to find out why, and whether the situation was likely to change.
The consensus on the day was decisive – fenestration wasn’t ready for triple glazing, and it possibly wasn’t the solution the sector needed anyway.
But in 2023, I sensed that mood starting to change. Triple glazing is being talked about more than ever.
Over the last ten years, the public conversation around sustainability has been transformed. Companies in our sector have been passionately flying the energy efficiency flag for decades, but for many in society more generally, it was seen as a niche issue.
Today, that couldn’t be further from the truth. It’s not just government policy driving the sudden urgency on sustainability – it’s public opinion too.
People are genuinely concerned about climate change and its potential impacts. At the same time, soaring energy costs have made thermal efficiency a major priority.
However, the biggest factor that’s put triple glazing back on the agenda in our sector is unquestionably the Future Homes Standard.
From 2025, the Future Homes Standard will require all UK newbuilds to produce 75-80% less carbon emissions. Frustratingly, we don’t know the exact details yet – but many in our sector are concluding that, to achieve such drastic reductions in emissions, triple glazing will have to become much more common.
I’ve recently talked about the Standard at two industry events – an Edgetech-organised roundtable discussion in Birmingham in September, and at the Glazing Summit in October.
Both were extremely valuable, but the Glazing Summit in particular highlighted something important – a lot of people in our industry don’t know what the Future Homes Standard is yet. A poll taken on the day revealed that 23% of attendees hadn’t heard of it before.
That’s not to shame anyone who doesn’t know about it – a large proportion of our sector only works in the refurb market, whereas the Future Homes Standard applies to new-build.
However, whatever impacts newbuild is inevitably going to impact the refurb market in some way – and so I think it’s important everyone in our sector understands it to some extent.
That’s one of the key reasons that next year Edgetech will be holding a second Triple Glazing Question event.
On Wednesday 27th March 2024, at the CBS Arena in Coventry, we’ll be hosting a day of discussion and debate on triple glazing, the Future Homes Standard, and the future of the industry.
www.edgetechig.co.uk
