Success for ‘Explore Offsite in the Housing Sector’ event

Explore Offsite in the Housing Sector

The latest in a series of building technology events – Explore Offsite in the Housing Sector – was a huge success yesterday.

Held at the National Motorcycle Museum, Birmingham, the combined conference and exhibition highlighted the benefits of offsite construction in the housing sector.

Much emphasis was placed on how this ever-evolving method of construction, which has been hailed as a major solution in resolving the current UK’s housing crisis, can build better homes at a faster pace.

The day kicked off with a video address by Housing & Planning Minister, Brandon Lewis MP, who stated the need to deliver ‘good quality, well built homes, built in a way like never before.’ In order to change the way the UK builds more homes the Minister urged the industry to embrace new technology – referring to offsite construction as ‘advanced housing manufacture.’

Presentations from leading industry pioneers included

• Dr Ashley Lane – Group Partnerships Director for Persimmon Homes, who delved into the history of offsite construction and spoke about how it has progressed in recent years through product range rationalisation, cost reduction measures, product technology and the maturity of trade attitudes.
• Oliver Novakovic; Technical and Innovation Director, Barratt Developments, who spoke about why they are embracing the best new methods of on and offsite construction to increase build efficiency.
• Bryan Woodley; Managing Director, Val-U-Therm presented ‘High Performance Building Envelope Design to Achieve PassivHaus Standards’
• Martin Taylor, Technical Business Development Director for LABC on streamlining compliance through design.
• Steve Wightman, Managing Director of Caledonian Modular explored the main issues of private residential housebuilding.
• Adam Greenfield; Managing Director, Nordic Construction stating that the benefits of offsite construction from a contractor’s perspective are predictability and repetition.

Speeches from social housing professionals included

• John Skivington and Tony Woods; LHC, with the presentation – ‘New Housing Supply – the need for new models of delivery.’
• Simon Vevers and Jim Martin from Hyde Housing Group spoke about how capacity can only be increased through offsite construction.
• Jim McMillan and Kevin Williams from Great Places Housing Group gave an update on volumetric processes and collaboration in the housing sector,
• John Bedford; Director of Project Development, Accord Housing gave his views on housing systems.

Launch of Offsite Construction Awards

These will celebrate innovation, best practice and expertise in offsite manufacturing and construction. The awards will be presented at a Drinks Reception on Wednesday 07 October 2015 as part of UK Construction Week at the National Exhibition Centre (NEC), Birmingham.

Next Explore Offsite event

Offsite in the Commercial Sector, is taking place on 24 November 2015, in Manchester