The latest report by the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has been endorsed by the Insulation Council of Australia and New Zealand (ICANZ).
The IPCC found that : “Energy efficiency options for new and existing buildings could considerably reduce CO2 emissions with net economic benefit.”
Dennis D’Arcy, ICANZ President, says that there are enormous economic, environmental and social benefits to be gained through demand-side solutions to the challenge of climate change, and improving the extent of insulation across Australia's housing stock is the most important.
According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics almost 40 per cent of Australian homes do not have ceiling insulation. These homes, many of them rental properties, waste energy and produce enormous quantities of unnecessary greenhouse gas emissions.
“Installing effective insulation into uninsulated homes creates substantial reductions in greenhouse gas emissions now, not in ten years or more,” D’Arcy says.
“Retrofitting insulation into uninsulated Australian homes is a low cost climate change response ripe for picking. It will deliver immediate and substantial greenhouse gas reductions for Australia,” he says.
ICANZ also claims that Australia’s housing stock is among the least energy efficient in the developed world, and policies that seek to redress this situation are in the best interests of Australia.
