Zero Ambitions Podcast

Zero Ambitions is a consultancy and weekly podcast about sustainability and the built environment. We find interesting and experienced guests who know what they're talking about, usually to discuss how we navigate the complexity of decarbonisation and sustainability in the built environment and its many related sectors.The success of the podcast has seen it grow into a consultancy, Zero Ambitions Partners. The consultancy works with blue chip clients, public sector institutions, and niche-market innovators that operate in the built environment, advising about the development and delivery of sustainability strategy and how it should be communicated.Hosted by Jeff Colley (Passive House Plus), Dan Hyde (Everything is User Experience) and Alex Blondin (Everything is User Experience).

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Recent Episodes
  • Embodied carbon and how sustainable is MMC? With Richard O'Hegarty (RKD, UCD) and Oliver Kinnane (UCD)
    Apr 8, 2025 – 01:26:46
  • Can we meet the skills gap the way we currently deliver training and what is the purpose of education? With Nathan Gambling (BetaTalk and BetaTeach)
    Mar 25, 2025 – 01:12:15
  • There is methodology for defining what ‘net zero carbon’ means for buildings in the UK and it looks great, with Jess Hrivnak (RIBA), Jane Anderson (ConstructionLCA), and Julie Godefroy (CIBSE)
    Mar 11, 2025 – 43:13
  • A 'global' standard for residential retrofit? With Paul Bagust (RICS Head of Property Standards), Steven Lees (RICS Senior Specialist - Residential Survey), and Robert Toomey (RICS Senior Public Affairs Officer)
    Feb 18, 2025 – 01:22:50
  • Can we address the decarbonisation of homes by focusing on health? With Jenny Danson (Healthy Homes Hub)
    Feb 4, 2025 – 01:06:04
  • Innovating and maturing: Loco Home Retrofit is an "emerging" retrofit one-stop-shop, with co-founder Chris Carus
    Jan 21, 2025 – 01:08:28
  • Eliminate construction waste – Loop Your Spare instead: circular thinking and platform technology that reduces the cost of construction for everyone, with Jay Stuart
    Jan 7, 2025 – 01:13:11
  • Speeding up external wall insulation installation and preparing a retrofit start-up for scale, with Max Bloomfield (VundaHaus) and Alex Whitcroft (KIN; VundaHaus)
    Dec 10, 2024 – 01:11:18
  • Experiments in low-carbon retrofit for a high-status building (with a basement), with Natalie Black (Enbee Architecture + Design) and Toby McLean (Allt Environmental Structural Engineers)
    Nov 26, 2024 – 01:22:39
  • Why we need to tell better stories about the built environment, with Liz Male (LMC)
    Nov 12, 2024 – 01:15:35
  • Don't Waste Buildings, which means retrofitting them and building them better. With Leanne Tritton (Ing Media), Will Hurst (Architect's Journal), and Richard Nelson (Abyss Global)
    Oct 25, 2024 – 01:25:56
  • Performance guarantees, measuring what works, and EPC reform, with Steven Heath (Knauf Insulation)
    Oct 8, 2024 – 01:27:43
  • Sustainability, sufficiency, and sequestration – the language we use and what it means, with Lloyd Alter
    Sep 24, 2024 – 01:08:21
  • Developers can build sustainably and at scale, if they want to. With Nicola Cronin and Stephen O'Shea (Cairn Homes Plc)
    Sep 10, 2024 – 01:11:20
  • How can we embed sustainable design into the construction process? With Mhairi Grant (Paper Igloo)
    Aug 27, 2024 – 01:10:01
  • Why is making UK homes more efficient so difficult? Leyla Boulton (Green Conservation; Financial Times)
    Aug 13, 2024 – 01:06:44
  • What can we do about waste in construction? Diversion from landfill isn't enough and there's money to be made. With Chris Clarke (SCAPE)
    Jul 30, 2024 – 01:05:50
  • Net zero neighbourhoods and financing change, with Cat Magill (Living Places)
    Jul 16, 2024 – 01:10:55
  • Running a successful retrofit one-stop-shop isn't easy but it can be done, with Caroline Ashe Brady (KORE Retrofit)
    Jul 2, 2024 – 01:16:22
  • The challenging life of a retrofit coordinator: problems with process, products, and performance, with returning champion Lisa Pasquale
    Jun 18, 2024 – 01:13:50
  • What should we do to get more women into retrofit? Well, we should get behind 'Her Retrofit Space', with Ellora Coupe (Her Own Space and now Her Retrofit Space)
    Jun 11, 2024 – 01:29:10
  • Building better performance: raising construction standards on site and in education, with Joseph Little (TUD)
    Jun 4, 2024 – 01:22:39
  • Retrofit as a movement for social change (there's more to it all than fabric and finance), with Dan Hill (Dark Matter Labs)
    May 28, 2024 – 01:13:09
  • Place-based hybrid finance to rebuild Ukraine and catalyse better building standards everywhere, with Iva Merheim Eyre (SMARTER4EU)
    May 21, 2024 – 01:11:08
  • Peter Rickaby returns to ZAP: a lot of words about energy, retrofit, and natural building materials, all the way from South Africa
    May 14, 2024 – 01:20:52
  • The UK has a weird relationship with heat pumps: under appreciated influencers, wild pricing, and bad vibes. With Andrew Sissons (Nesta)
    May 7, 2024 – 01:21:03
  • Building with straw on a continental scale and experiencing retrofit as a resident. With Cypren Edmunds (European Straw Building Association)
    Apr 30, 2024 – 01:16:34
  • The energy performance of buildings matters, to me and EU and everyone we know, with Ciarán Cuffe (MEP)
    Apr 23, 2024 – 51:04
  • A new way to measure performance, negative energy use, and learning from disaster zones, with Kate Crawford (KLH Sustainability)
    Apr 16, 2024 – 01:17:08
  • Designing for deconstruction using natural building materials. With Chloe Donovan (Natural Building Systems)
    Apr 9, 2024 – 01:12:39
  • Monitoring will make your buildings be worth more money, Utopi has proved it, with Falk Bleyl (CTO at Utopi)
    Apr 2, 2024 – 01:20:21
  • “Use less stuff”: embodied carbon, value chains and the potential for change in the Declaration de Chaillot. With Lloyd Alter (Carbon Upfront), Kelly Alvarez Doran (Ha/f Climate Design), and Will Arnold (The Institution of Structural Engineers)
    Mar 26, 2024 – 01:16:05
  • What do we do about ‘the office’? A retrofit challenge we don't speak about enough. With Harry Browne and Séamus Guidera (RKD)
    Mar 19, 2024 – 01:20:03
  • Fundamental problems in building design and how we manage thermal comfort, with Susan Roaf (Heriot-Watt; ICARB)
    Mar 12, 2024 – 01:33:08
  • Fabric fifth: rethinking the hierarchy of retrofit, with Nigel Banks (Octopus Energy)
    Mar 5, 2024 – 01:10:20
  • Retrofit: "We need to tackle low hanging fruit first", so what does that mean? With Fionn Stevenson
    Feb 27, 2024 – 01:28:14
  • Natural materials, healthier homes, and the culture of sustainable building, with Will Kirkman (Ecomerchant)
    Feb 20, 2024 – 01:16:15
  • Engineering low-impact buildings and advice from self build, with Tara Fraser (Build Collective)
    Feb 13, 2024 – 01:00:16
  • Shady business #2: shading for housing in a changing climate, with Tom Dollard (Pollard Thomas Edwards)
    Feb 6, 2024 – 01:28:59
  • A view from COP28, and relearning how to be an architect for after the Oil Age, with Kelly Alvarez Doran (Half Climate Design; Architecture 2030 Senior Fellow)
    Jan 30, 2024 – 01:21:36
  • Conservation-led retrofit and energy efficiency for working buildings, with with Heidi Hopper-Duffy and David Hughes (Iarnród Éireann)
    Jan 23, 2024 – 57:32
  • The cost of sustainability, accounting for language, and the taxonomy, with Archie O'Donnell (KOSMOS)
    Jan 16, 2024 – 57:42
  • PH+ Revisited: that archive building in Hereford, the one that uses passive house preservation, with Nick Grant and Alan Clarke
    Jan 10, 2024 – 56:05
  • How to normalise low-energy heating without radiators: an overnight success story that's fifteen years in the making, with Ethan Wadsworth (ThermaSkirt)
    Jan 2, 2024 – 01:09:19
  • PH+ revisited: Seeing the wood for the trees (part two), with Andy Simmonds (AECB) and Lenny Antonelli (PH+)
    Dec 26, 2023 – 58:54
  • PH+ revisited: Seeing the wood for the trees (part one), with Andy Simmonds (AECB) and Lenny Antonelli (PH+)
    Dec 25, 2023 – 01:05:27
  • Shady business #1 – overheating, and Camden: we should think about solar gain all year round, with Zoe De Grussa (BBSA)
    Dec 19, 2023 – 01:16:41
  • POE and its value to retrofit, and what does a Head of Sustainability do? With Loreana Padron (ECD Architects)
    Dec 12, 2023 – 01:17:56
  • Standards and specifications, and why they don't always work like we want them to, with Sarah Price, the author of PAS2035/2030 (Retrofitting dwellings for improved energy efficiency)
    Dec 5, 2023 – 01:18:50
  • Roadmaps for fuel poverty and retrofit: we know what needs to be done so why can’t we do it? With Tania Jennings (Chair of the Association of Local Energy Officers, London)
    Nov 28, 2023 – 01:21:03
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