Retrofitting Wales

Today at Procurex Wales 2025, held in partnership with the Welsh Government, Sureserve’s Emma Nicklin chaired a panel in the Sustainable and Social Procurement Zone. 

The panel topic was Retrofitting Wales: A National Conversation on Homes, Health, Energy and the Future.  

The panel chaired by Emma was made up of Solitaire Pritchard from Pobl, James Green from Breathe Pure, and Chris Marshall from Marley.  

It was standing room only to listen to the talk. Emma led with the challenge facing us all in Wales, from the the Valleys to the cities, in retrofitting homes to create warm and safe places to live for our residents.  

The first question to the panel was ‘how do we work together to deliver warm and safe home through retrofitting in Wales.’  

James talked about the growing focus on humidity control and stopping damp and mould in the home. There is no silver bullet, each property needs to be assessed. The key is diving into the IOT data to extract and understand the humidity challenges. This is even more important with the new timeframes of action driven by Awaab’s law. Case by case is key – no two homes are the same. 

Chris discussed his work with Swansey among others, showcasing a case study in Cornwall and how we can learn from different property types across the UK. For Chris teaming up early is key – supplier, service owner and housing association.  

Solitaire discussed how POBL led the way with an EU funded approach to reducing bills and powering communities. It was an agile way of working, scaling up to 11 installs a week across a 2 year period. This innovation was industry leading and created the blueprint to scale up.  

Emma shared that Wales is not short of ambition, but like all of UK is short on capacity. She asked about long term resourcing and what is the solution in the panels opinion. Chris mentioned the need to train more people, with over 1000 through the Marley centre this year, and also talked about the importance of providing training on site in the community. ‘We need local people to install and maintain locally.’ 

Solitaire discussed how recruitment and training is a challenge, mentioning the challenges of recruiting and retaining surveyors and DLO. All face this challenge. ‘We need to invest in the green skills and working with communities. With the 3 million lottery funding in Swansea, we at Pobl are targeting our communities to enable education pathways to be available and delivered in the communities that need it.’  

Emma reinforced that no one part of the supply chain can achieve what needs to be done alone. ‘We won’t be able to do this in silo; the whole supply chain needs to work together.’  James agreed, partnerships are key, working as providers of technology, the suppliers and installers alongside the housing providers. The way to win is about building healthy relationships, working on problems together.  

The funding landscape in Wales shows we need to work to learn from other areas to do it better, do it for longer. Chirs reinforced again that the key to success is early engagement, ahead of tender, to maximise the plan and deliver the best for the residents and the communities.  

A question from the audience was around PAS 2035 and what the impact was. All are working to move to PAS approved solutions. 

Emma finished the panel by sharing a closing thought. ‘There is still so much to do. It is key we engage residents and we work together. We are all here to work it out.’