A retrofit construction project aims to create healthier housing. There are some important terms to incorporate into your lexicon when talking about it:

Retrofit: A retrofit is a renovation project on an existing building, typically driven by energy efficiency goals, but also including asset improvements, urgent repairs, accessibility upgrades and other modernization work.

Deep Energy Retrofit: A deep energy retrofit upgrades major building systems, often including the building envelope system, to produce significant energy and carbon reductions. We define a deep energy retrofit as one that results in 40% or more carbon emissions savings. Deep energy retrofits almost always require many factors to be taken into account to re-configure the way the building works. This is a 'holistic' approach to retrofit, or one that looks at the building systems and structures as a whole. Understanding how elements of a complex construction project comes together to create a healthier living environment will help you to advocate for healthier housing.

Co-benefits: While retrofits are most often undertaken to meet energy efficiency targets, there are many other benefits that they can provide: health, comfort, safety, accessibility, other repairs. These co-benefits are often much more important to tenants than the energy efficiency outcomes. Understanding what is most important to each type of stakeholder on a construction site is crucial to being a healthy housing advocate.

Comfort: Comfort is one of the most important outcomes of a healthy building. When people are comfortable in their homes, they are not suffering from thermal stress, mould exposure, disruption from noise and odours, and they are breathing clean tempered air. As a result, they tend to be healthier, more productive, stay out of hospital, and generally have better social outlook. Helping tenants to understand what they can expect after a retrofit will help to keep everyone on a construction site working toward the same goals.

Disruption: Even though the outcomes of a deep energy retrofit may be positive for everyone involved, the construction process itself is very likely to be disruptive. Tenants may not understand why the work is happening, or how it will positively affect them once complete. Tenants may be nervous about letting construction teams into their apartments, or about the impact of dust and noise on their health and daily lives. Understanding and anticipating these concerns will be part of your expertise as a Healthy Housing Advocate.