Cost of retrofitting old homes could reach £56,000 per property according to Scarborough Council

Scarborough Council will be applying for Government funding to financially support residents seeking to retrofit their properties to make them more energy efficient and environmentally friendly.

North Yorkshire aims to be carbon-neutral by 2035 and carbon net negative by 2040, which will require private and public buildings to be made more energy efficient.

The importance of retrofitting and energy efficiency has been raised as an increasingly pressing issue amid rising energy costs and the climate crisis.

However, council officials have said that the cost of retrofitting a Victorian domestic property, or similar terraced or stone-built rural building, could be as high as £56,000.

Cllr Michelle Donhue-Moncrieff, Scarborough Council’s cabinet member for the environment, said: “I think for us you have to start with what is realistic here, what is the scope of the problem, and how do you solve it?”

She added: “The issue in areas like ours is that £56,000 is a higher percentage against some house values compared to other areas in the country. So it’s a significant amount.”

Grants to offset the costs of retrofitting have already been available this year to households on lower incomes and now the authority will be seeking further Government funding to increase the number of properties that are retrofitted.

Scarborough Council’s own Better Homes Joint Venture, which aims to create high-quality affordable housing in the borough, has also been taking a lead on environmental standards.

Speaking to the Local Democracy Reporting Service, Harry Baross, the council’s head of climate change, said: “We are aiming to bring forward those Future Homes 2025 Standards into the Better Homes projects earlier than 2025.”

He added: “That means going forward with lower bills and not having to do those big costs to replace it. And so getting that Future Standard into Better Homes is the one area where we have been able to exercise what we think is important as a council.”

Despite the progress being made with the council’s own housing project, a lack of regulation and clarity from the government when it comes to requiring certain standards has been raised as an issue.

Cllr Donohue-Moncrieff said: “It’s all very fine when you talk about getting rid of regulations and making it easier to build, but that often means getting rid of the things that actually futureproof those buildings.

“And part of the problem is that we seem to be running our planning in this country around what the big builders want to do rather than what would actually be more sustainable for society in the long run.”

She added: “But you are always in a situation as a council where central government pulls the rug from under your feet every time you try to make any progress on these types of issues.”