Cotswold District Council has been awarded £30,000 from the local government housing advisers programme to develop a toolkit to aid the delivery of highly efficient carbon neutral homes.

This year, the council declared a ‘climate emergency’ with the aim of achieving carbon neutrality within the next decade.

With this in mind, they have successfully bid into the housing advisers programme to secure expert advice to assist in the production of a toolkit that will guide how carbon neutral developments could be achieved.

Cllr Lisa Spivey, cabinet member for housing and homelessness, Cotswold District Council, said: “This is a really exciting opportunity for us to innovate and provide a robust guide for developers and homeowners to advance carbon neutral design in what is a very rural area.

"As the lead authority on this project, we are committed to working together with our partner councils to create sustainable and vibrant developments whilst protecting our landscape and heritage.

“The council’s work to tackle the climate emergency goes hand in hand with delivering social rented homes, if we build carbon zero houses we significantly reduce the energy costs for future tenants.”

Work towards the toolkit will run alongside the production of local plan policies with an aim to introduce the toolkit for publication by spring 2021.

The carbon neutral toolkit will assist developers, housing providers, existing homeowners, self-builders and local communities wishing to work with the council to bring forward sustainable carbon neutral applications.