Cmi CONTENTS

4 News Items from the industry and the wider economy

10 CIOB News

The Student Challenge competition – tomorrow’s leaders shine!

18 The Lie of the Land

We check in with our friends from Construction Information Services

23 Out & About

At the tsb Ideal Home Show 2023 and more

26 ESB Networks

A message for our readers

28 Clúid

21 Lean Journeys

Lean Construction Ireland launch training course portfolio

Clúid Housing and Clann deliver new homes in Portlaoise

30 Pipelife Eco

Leading designer and supplier of thousands of Home Heating Solutions each year

34 Training & Careers

Designer Group, Kirby, Chadwicks, Engineers Ireland and so much more!

43 Green Building

We check in with the Irish Green Building Council (IGBC)

46 Facilities Management

Once again here’s our FM guru, Pat Gaughan

48 And Finally

Again, Jeff Haden rounds it all off for us on an inspiring note!

32 A message from Suir

‘Suir Engineering continues to invest in their most important assets, their people’

Irish construction activity slips deeper into contraction territory

Ireland's construction sector continued to struggle during April amid a sharper contraction in activity and slower rises in new orders, employment and input buying.

Little respite was offered in terms of any easing in inflationary and supply pressures. In fact, the extents to which supplier performance worsened and input prices increased were greater than seen in March.

Optimistic

Still, firms were optimistic in their outlook for the future. The headline seasonally adjusted BNP Paribas Real Estate Ireland Construction Total Activity Index posted below the crucial 50.0 mark separating growth from contraction in April to signal a seventh successive reduction in total activity.

At 48.4, down from 49.5 in March, the latest reading was indicative of the most pronounced reduction in Irish construction activity in three months.

The latest data highlighted a sustained decline in housing activity that was stronger than seen in the previous survey period. Meanwhile, commercial activity increased for a third month in a row, albeit only mildly. According to survey respondents, construction activity was weighed down by a general slowdown in market demand.

Uplift

Nevertheless, April survey data signalled a sustained uplift in new order inflows at the start of the second quarter of 2023. But, with customers still reportedly cautious about market conditions, the increase was only marginal overall and historically subdued.

A rise in workforce numbers of the same magnitude was subsequently recorded in April as companies looked to add to their staffing levels in line with the uplift in sales.

As such, the rate of job creation was the weakest in the current four-month sequence. Similarly, firms increased their buying activity in April but at the slowest pace in three months.

Elsewhere, Irish construction firms continued to grapple with a further lengthening in average delivery times. In

SEAI AWARDS €19 MILLION IN GOVERNMENT FUNDING FOR ENERGY RESEARCH PROJECTS IN IRELAND

The Sustainable Energy Authority of Ireland has announced that it has awarded approximately €19m in Government funding to support more than forty new energy research projects across Ireland.

These projects bring together leading academic institutes, companies, and public sector organisations and were supported with co-funding from the Department of Transport, the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine and ESB Networks.

The 2023 Climate Action Plan aims to transform and improve life in Ireland, setting out how Ireland will accelerate action to respond to the climate and energy crisis, with research and innovation central to achieving these goals.

Projects awarded are directly aligned to national energy targets and ambitions and will be central to informing Ireland’s climate action and achievement of our medium- to longterm climate and energy targets.

Projects awarded cover a wide range of topics including research investigating, among others: offshore wind technologies, with hen harriers, fact, the extent to which lead times worsened was the greatest since January.

Quickened

The rate of input cost inflation has been on a downward trend since its peak in October 2021 but, against this trend, the rate of costs increases pickedup slightly in April. Inflation of the rates charged by subcontractors also quickened from March.

Sub-contractor usage was up for a third month in a row, while availability fell at the sharpest rate in nine months.

Firms remained positive in their projections for output over the coming year. Optimism was mainly centred around hopes for a pick-up in developmental activity.

of residential buildings, and inclusion for energy sector transformation.

Minister for the Environment, Climate and Communications, crucial to address Ireland’s energy and climate ambitions.

Development and Demonstration Funding Programme continues to support our national experts to innovate.

‘Successful projects demonstrate enthusiasm to find solutions to Ireland’s energy needs, to support policy with cutting-edge research outputs and ultimately to accelerate Ireland’s clean energy transition.’