Welcome…....to this update on environmental and sustainability issues at Castleoak, where our approach is to be as practical as possible.

The central objectives of our strategy are to reduce our own carbon footprint and to reduce carbon usage, energy consumption and embedded carbon in the buildings we develop and build.

We are keen to work with all our customers to explore the introduction of energy and waste saving measures. This can be done through your project team or by speaking to Colwyn Knight or Miles Thomas, whose details are published throughout this newsletter.

I hope what we have to say will be of interest.

Best wishes.

Melville KnightGroup Chief Executive

Ecobuild 2011A number of Castleoak employees attended Ecobuild 2011 - the world’s biggest event for sustainable design and construction - in March. They made the trip to the Excel Centre, London to source new, more sustainable products, services and solutions to potentially improve the environmental credentials of future schemes.

Key Activities• Reducing the carbon footprint of our operations• Reducing the carbon footprint of our projects • Collaborating with our customers• Engaging with industry bodies• Innovating and sharing best practice

Publishing Our Strategy

Having developed our environmental strategy as part of our business planning activities to 2016, we are currently preparing a version for publication in the summer.

The Castleoak Team

In the past six months, Colwyn Knight, MD of our design and build arm for more than 25 years, has moved to a new role as Group Innovation Director. Sustainability is a key part of his portfolio and he leads on all matters environmental, and the pace of our progress on this front has increased since he has been driving the agenda at Board level. Colwyn has always been closely involved with sites and spearheaded operational innovations. He has always been a champion of the partnership method of construction management, and had introduced many of the ideas advocated in the groundbreaking report published in 1998 by Sir John Egan (Rethinking Construction), long before they became fashionable. He has been instrumental in the company’s pursuit of the Lean Construction agenda and its commitment to modern methods of construction, especially its use of timber frame.

Environmental Update

Miles Thomas has been our Environmental Manager since September 2008. A Swansea University graduate with a first degree in Development Studies, Miles then studied for an MSc from the University of Glamorgan in Sustainable Environmental Development. He joined us from an agency where he was responsible for providing environmental advice to businesses and quickly established our Environmental Management Systems. He works with Colwyn on our environment strategy and spends a lot of time working alongside all our departments, but most particularly with our Design, M&E, Construction and Timber Frame teams to improve our environmental performance.

Colwyn and Miles introduced our Sustainability Group, which meets regularly to discuss key issues and is made up of representatives from all areas of the business.

Colwyn Knight

Miles Thomas

April 2011

Environment Team on Their Bikes!

Castleoak has received grant funding from Cardiff City Council to purchase ‘pool bikes’, including a folding bike, for use by Castleoak staff. These will be available during working hours, for travel to local shops or meetings, and bookable for weekends/holidays for personal use. Environmental Manger, Miles Thomas explained, “The grants were awarded as part of Cardiff’s Sustainable Travel City initiative. The arrival of the bikes will be another step in reducing our carbon footprint and will help with our health and well being objectives too.”

UK’s first PassivHaus care home to cut energy costs and CO2 emissions by 60%

We have just begun developing the UK’s first PassivHaus care home, predicted to reduce energy costs and CO2 emissions by around 60% .*

We acquired the site at Brackley in Northamptonshire last year and secured planning for a much-needed, purpose-built, high quality, 60-bed care home. It will be let to Barchester Healthcare on completion and the development is backed by investment from Bridges Sustainable Property Fund, which requires projects to demonstrate environmental leadership.

The PassivHaus standard, which originated in Germany, refers to buildings which have excellent comfort conditions in both winter and summer achieved through energy efficient construction. Key requirements are a very high standard of thermal insulation and minimum air loss to minimise energy demand.

Group Innovation Director, Colwyn Knight, led a multi-disciplinary team including the Group’s Design, M&E, Timber Frame and Estimating teams and our Environmental Manager, to develop the Brackley project. He emphasises the balance the team needed to strike between progressing the environmental agenda and satisfying the commercial requirement.

“Our proposal had to be very precise with costs, outlining the exact initial investment required versus the achievable future cost savings for Barchester,” he said.

Energy Consumption Survey

Results have now been collated from our first ever energy consumption survey, which was carried out in December and January. We contacted a range of customers requesting information about energy usage figures in a typical 60 bed care home and have collated this data in an anonymous format which is now available for wider distribution.

With rising energy costs and the probability of carbon taxes in the future, thermal efficiency is a critical element within our design process and this data provides us with an important benchmark.

Anyone wanting further information should contact cknight@castleoak.co.uk or mthomas@castleoak.co.uk

Allowances? A capital idea!

Much is made of the so called “extra costs” attaching to the introduction of increased sustainability measures on building projects.

Help is at hand for Corporation Tax payers, however, in the form of accelerated Capital Allowances for energy saving capital expenditure.

This is a complex issue but it offers great advantages and is well worth customers checking with Finance Departments or external advisors.

Award-winning Considerate Construction at Oxted

Our completed Oxted site has won a Considerate Constructors Scheme (CCS) 2011 National Site Award, placing it among the highest scoring 7½% of all UK sites completed in 2010.

The Awards recognise sites’ excellent standards of consideration towards their workforce, their neighbours and the environment and all our sites are scored during regular visits from the Scheme’s monitors. An independent panel reviews all eligible sites and decides which should win a National Site Award and what level of Award they receive. Just over 640 winners have been selected from some 8500 eligible sites for Bronze, Silver or Gold Awards, with the level of Award for every winning site only revealed on the day of the ceremony.

Our site team at Holland Road, Hurst Green in Oxted, under the leadership of Construction Manager, Barrie Herbert, and Project Director, Jon Schofield, received consistently high scores from the CCS assessors ahead of the handover of Windmill Manor to

Site Waste Management Plans (SWMPs) impress EA

The Environment Agency (EA) has highlighted our Site Waste Management Plan (SWMP) documentation and on-site practices as an example of best practice.

The commendation came following the EA’s visits to our Marlow and Banbury sites and its examination of Marlow’s post-construction environmental documentation and review after handover. This was part of a pilot project of site inspections in the South East of England which is now to be rolled out by the Agency UK-wide.

Green is not just for sites!

Although they are the areas where we can make the biggest impact, our environmental efforts are not just restricted to our sites. For example, our timber frame factory has taken delivery of a new baler which is already making environmental and financial savings, with transport costs and the number of skips used reduced by 50%. The team segregates all its plastic, cardboard and paper waste, which is then all baled, saving space in skips, and 100% is recycled.

We are also set to save around three tonnes of CO2 every year following the replacement of spotlights at Raglan House (our head office) with more efficient LED lighting.

This has also created a more comfortable working environment, particularly for those who work in our particularly well-lit Reception, as LED lighting doesn’t produce the heat that spotlights do. This type of lighting also requires much less maintenance and has a longer operating life, so, over time, the savings will be considerable.

Measuring our embodied carbon

Group Innovation Director, Colwyn Knight, has been working with Estimator, John Turner, to establish the embodied carbon of our projects and look at ways to keep reducing it.

Embodied carbon refers to the energy consumed and the subsequent carbon emissions associated with all materials used in the construction of buildings. It adopts a so-called ‘Cradle-to-Gate’ approach, from the extraction of raw materials to processing them into products, transportation, installation, maintenance and final disposal. It is therefore critical to accurately establishing the carbon footprint of any of our projects and therefore reducing it through, for example, the use of more recycled/recyclable materials or local products.

“We understand that our responsibility towards our carbon footprint isn’t just through our energy use on site or travel around the country,” said Colwyn.

“One of the biggest things we can do to reduce carbon emissions is to work with our customers to select materials that will reduce the embodied carbon that goes into our buildings.”

CTF retains Green Dragon Level 5 certification

Castleoak Timber Frame is one of only six private companies in the UK to achieve Level 5 of the Green Dragon Environmental Standard.

This environmental certification scheme goes beyond requirements of ISO14001 and EMAS and was achieved by our factory team in Ebbw Vale and our design team in Malvern back in 2009, and retained on annual certification last year.

“Our approach was to balance pioneering and practicality, ensuring the building will not only meet the strict PassivHaus standard, but also the requirements Barchester specify for their care homes. Fortunately, both have the health and comfort of residents at the top of their list.”

The team looked at cost and buildability when specifying insulation materials, windows, doors, heat recovery systems, and used the highly detailed PassivHaus planning process to calculate the designed building’s heating demand and therefore future energy usage. “Now we have designed a home which will require around 40% of the annual energy costs and produce around 40% of the CO2 emissions of a typical 60-bed, timber frame care home

Castleoak’s Scheme at Brackley

Reception at Raglan House

Barchester in September 2010.

This Award will be presented at one of CCS’s 11 National Award ceremonies, with our team travelling to London to collect their award. See the news section of www.castleoak.co.uk for an update.

“Considerate Constructors is a really important way of demonstrating how we deliver projects responsibly and positively, which is not only important to us but also to our customers and our local communities,” said Chief Operating Officer, Paul Stephens.

Edward Hardy, Chief Executive, Considerate Constructors Scheme said,

“Castleoak are clearly a dedicated company, committed to improving themselves, and conscious of those affected by their work. Their increasing site visit scores year on year highlight this fact and how far they have come. Emphasising this point even further is their nomination for a Considerate Constructors Scheme National Site Award in 2011. I congratulate them on their continued commitment to the values of the Scheme.”

Following the visits, an Agency inspector wrote as follows:

“I was impressed by how much detail was included. Castleoak had not only covered all the parts that are set out in regulations, but also set out monthly environmental reports, on site monitoring of waste targets and continuous review and updating of the SWMP. Information on the Castleoak Site Waste Management Plan has been passed to our EA Project Lead as an example of best practice in developing SWMPs. “I would consider the way the site was organised and the way the SWMP was followed and updated to be an example of best practice in respect to the SWMP Regs.”

Chief Operating Officer, Paul Stephens, was delighted and said,

“I believe this is high praise from a demanding agency, for both the quality of the plan and the Marlow team’s compliance with it.”

Sir Aubrey Ward House, Marlow, a 60-bed care home, was our fifth scheme for Project Care, Buckinghamshire’s reprovisioning programme, for Housing Solutions in partnership with the Fremantle Trust and the county council. It was handed over in June 2010.

built to comply with current building regulations,” continued Colwyn.

“Significantly, our calculations show that the initial required investment in higher specification systems and materials will be paid back through lower utility bills in a little over six years – sooner if energy prices rise as predicted.”

We are also conducting a full sustainability review at Brackley, and so additional environmental gains will be made through the use of, for example, low energy lighting, controlled lighting systems, waste streaming and low water use fittings.

* all figures quoted exclude the energy used in kitchen and laundry areas to enable comparison using the PassivHaus model

To find out how Castleoak can help reduce the carbon footprints on your new developments, please contact ................................. ................................. Colwyn Knight on 029 2054 8650 (cknight@castleoak.co.uk) or Miles Thomas on 029 2054 8648 (mthomas@castleoak.co.uk)

BREEAM / Code for Sustainable Homes News

BREEAM (BRE Environmental Assessment Method) is the leading and most widely used environmental assessment method for buildings, setting the standard for best practice in sustainable design. It has become the most common method used to describe a building’s environmental performance and, as such, it is used to assess our care home projects under a Multi-Residential version of the standard. The Code for Sustainable Homes is also a widely recognised environmental assessment method for buildings, and, as this scheme is tailored to focus on individual living units, our Extra Care developments are often certified under this standard.

Currently, we are seeking BREEAM and Code for Sustainable Homes certification at the following projects:

BREEAM Very Good

• Marnel Lodge, Basingstoke A 62-bed care home development we completed for Barchester Healthcare earlier this year

BREEAM Excellent

• Station Road, Wadhurst A 65-bed care home development for Barchester Healthcare• Higher Drive, Purley Two-phase project delivering a 54-bed ABI (acquired brain injury) care unit for Fairlie House• Parkgate Road, Mollington A 70-bed care home development for Barchester Healthcare due to start on site shortly

Code for Sustainable Homes - Level 3

• Assisi Place, Leeds 45 extra care apartments for MHA Care Group• Orchard Fields, Banbury 40 extra care apartments for the Oxfordshire Care Partnership (bpha and Orders of St John Care Trust) as part of the county’s reprovisioning programme. (A 60-bed care home was also built on the site)

Lightbulb moment with Barchester

Our design team has completed a project with a team from longstanding customer, Barchester Healthcare, to improve the lighting schemes in our projects.

Our two teams got together last year to review and redesign lighting in bedrooms, kitchens and corridors, meeting in the day then into the night to best critique existing designs. The aims were to save energy, improve the aesthetics and ensure staff would be able to control certain elements of the lighting locally.

The project is now complete, with a new design philosophy meeting BREEAM Excellent principles. It has also resulted in new lighting control energy improvement measures in corridor and ensuite areas, which means significant potential savings can be made. The use of new LED emergency lighting will also lead to significant maintenance cost savings.

Soft Landing for Castleoak CustomersCastleoak has signed up to the Soft Landings initiative operated by the Building Services Research and Information Association (BSRIA). Soft Landings is a process for designers and constructors to improve the operational performance of buildings and provide valuable feedback to project teams. It requires designers and constructors to remain involved with buildings beyond practical completion, to assist the client during the first months of operation and beyond, to help fine-tune and de-bug the systems, and ensure that occupiers understand how to control and best use their buildings. It is all about delivering a great experience of moving into a building and ensuring smooth operation.

A key component of the scheme is post occupancy sustainability surveys. All parties can benefit from the lessons learned from these.

Marnel Lodge, Basingstoke

Assisi Place, Leeds

Raglan House, Malthouse Avenue, Cardiff Gate Business Park, Cardiff, CF23 8BA Tel: 029 2054 8800 wwwcastleoak.co.uk

Some of the Castleoak M&E Team L to R : Robert Woolcock, Chaula Meghani, Gareth Jones and Dave Morris

* This publication has been printed on 100% recycled material