Overview of Ecobuild

Before going to ExCel, the Ecobuild website was great for deciding what to see but on arrival the exhibition was a touch overwhelming! There were huge numbers of solar pv stalls & rather too many ‘big boys’ who had tagged green credentials onto ‘business as usual’. Some of the talks which sounded fascinating turned out to be slightly dull & I’m sure the ones I missed were wonderful! You can now download many of the presentations. Highlights of the 3 days were Baroness Susan Greenfield on ‘The age of unreason: the psychology of climate change’ and the ‘Can Science Save Us?’ lecture by Prof Brian Cox.

For me it was rather too full of massive stalls & greenwash, with the really interesting small companies huddled around the edges of the halls. Quite different to earlier years where the focus had been innovation & energy saving. I did manage to catch up with some of my favourite projects & materials, particularly Bill Dunster’s StramitZED, the enocean PV powered wireless window contact systems (potential for wireless monitoring of when blinds are up or down), some glorious green roof systems and my husband’s ‘signpost’ on the UKGBC stand for his Sustainable Housing award for the Threshold Centre, Gillingham.

UKGBC signpost for Threshold Centre

Meeting for a catch-up with Bill Gething & Craig White again was great & I finally got to meet ECDA’s Mark Elton!  Met several new peeps previously met only through twitter, including the lovely Mel Starrs & Liz Male.

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