We were delighted to welcome our local MP, Joe Morris, Member of Parliament for Hexham, for a fact-finding visit to Warksburn Old Church today, 24 September 2025.
Joe was interested in exploring how the energy saving technologies pioneered here, during the world’s first Passivhaus-certified church conversion, can be more broadly applied in UK housing to slash both energy bills and carbon emissions.
As we discussed during Joe’s visit, if it’s possible to turn a cold, damp and draughty Victorian building into one of the most energy efficient buildings in the UK, it’s going to be much easier to deliver new build housing to a similar standard. Warksburn Old Church, with its negative annual energy bill and 100% green power, proves that that ‘Zero Energy Cost, Zero Energy Carbon (“2ZEC”) housing is a buildable reality.
Following Joe’s visit we look forward to sharing best practice with others in Westminster and Whitehall developing policy around some of the biggest challenges of the Net Zero Transition, including the decarbonisation of domestic heating, combining smart energy tariffs with local storage, and radical updating of building standards.