In 2017, the CRCLCL successfully responded to a tender from the Office of Environment and Heritage (OEH) in the NSW government to lead their new Energy Efficiency Decision Making Node as part of their research programme. The OEH and the CRCLCL have both contributed resources to fund a number of projects which the CRCLCL in turn commissions from its partners and administers for the OEH.
The Energy Efficiency Decision Making in the NSW Social Housing Sector project seeks to identify and understand the institutional, structural, material and perceptual opportunities and barriers that shape decision-making of social housing providers in NSW on the implementation of energy efficiency upgrades, including their scope and scale.
The project will provide OEH and other relevant agencies with key insights into:
- what motivates CHPs to consider efficiency upgrades
- strategic plans in place (or planned) for these upgrades
- barriers to implementing such plans
- what improvements in outcomes (actual and expected) are experienced by community housing providers and tenants.
The project team will take a mixed method approach to establishing an evidence base for policymakers to devise appropriate solutions, especially in overcoming barriers that social housing providers face in performing upgrades to their properties. It will comprise an international literature review; 25 interviews with senior management of social housing providers of various sizes and locations in NSW (approximately 20% of social housing providers in NSW); a housing quality questionnaire; development of a spot measurement protocol for data collection at 100 dwellings for simulation; and a qualitative assessment of improvement outcomes.