Glossary

BEIS - UK Department of Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy

GWh - Gigawatt hours

EPC - Energy Performance Certificate

NHS - National Health Service

Biodiversity net gain: a habitat-based approach used to assess an area’s value to wildlife. The metric uses habitat features to calculate a biodiversity value. Biodiversity net gain means a development or change in land management will positively contribute to the biodiversity on that site.

Brownfield: Previously developed land that is not currently in use.

Greenfield: Undeveloped land in an urban or rural area either used for agriculture or landscape design, or left to evolve naturally.

MMC: Modern methods of construction a process to produce more, better quality homes in less time. They aim to improve business efficiency, quality, customer satisfaction, environmental performance, sustainability and the predictability of delivery timescales.

Low carbon: For the purpose of this Challenge Brief, low carbon refers to housing that is aiming to produce as little carbon in its lifetime use and delivery as possible. To enable wider participation from innovators, we opt for the use of low carbon as opposed to narrowly defining of carbon emissions, which might restrict the opportunities for potential solutions.

Nature positive: Measured against a baseline prior to development, nature positive developments are ones that increase the health, abundance, diversity and resilience of species, populations and ecosystems