Good Energy customer John Fowler has abseiled down Salisbury Cathedral, rock climbed all over the world, and could save you over 70% on your heating bills. Certainly a guy we wanted to find out more about.

He set up Virtual Energy, an energy simulation consultancy, at the end of 2010 after completing a Masters degree in Advanced Environmental & Energy Studies at the Centre for Alternative Technology – another Good Energy customer. “I’ve always been into extreme sports that take me outside. I’ve rock climbed all over the world and surf and mountain bike too so I have a close affinity to the environment and feel very strongly about protecting it. With my seven years in IT technical support and the 10 years on and off I spent doing historic building conservations” – it’s this that took him to the top of Salisbury Cathedral spire – “I felt that the best impact I could have was to improve the thermal efficiency of buildings through computer modelling.”

Applicable across both new-build properties and existing housing stock John works with architects, designers, home builders and home owners, advising them on how to optimise a property’s thermal efficiency. “If you take an old untreated house my models could show you how to save over 70% on heating bills quite comfortably,” says John. “But it’s all about context. The type of building in questions is obviously extremely important but so is what the customer wants to achieve. Are they looking to create a really environmentally sensitive building? Are they looking at cutting carbon emissions? Or do they simply want to save money? I had one customer, for example, who was contemplating digging up his concrete floor to put some insulation down. But when we modelled the house we realised that most of the heat was lost through the stone walls. Understandably he left the floor alone and draft proofed and insulated the walls instead! Helping people target the options that are most cost-effective is the one of the main functions of the models.” And when a house already has a high thermal efficiency? “Well, I offer advice on other steps they could take. Maybe looking at their heating system, or the way they use their energy. Switching to Good Energy is one that I use a lot too!” says John.

“I see so much energy being wasted. And quite apart from the environmental and financial benefits to what I do, there are social benefits too. Averting fuel poverty is something that’s really important to me but when a building is ‘healthy’ it’s a healthier environment for its inhabitants too.”

Unsurprisingly, John is keeping a close eye on how he can best utilise the upcoming Green Deal which from next year will give homeowners access to up to £10,000 to pay for energy efficiency work, repaying the costs through savings on energy bills. However, it’s new builds and Passivhaus design that really excite him.

“The core principle of these new designs is in almost-eliminating any heating requirements by removing draughts, and maximising insulation and passive solar gain, but there are concerns that the houses could overheat. Using the software I can get really accurate predictions of whether this might happen and how best to mitigate that. I create a 3D model from the design, mapping all the windows, doors and walls, globally locate it by allocating weather files and orientate it - north, south, east or west. Once you’ve got all this baseline data in place you can play around with all sorts of materials and things like window size to find the ultimate mix. It usually takes about a day to create a model and then I feed the information back in a spreadsheet showing the possible options.”

If you’re interested in seeing John in action and are in the Dorchester area on June 25^th then head along to the Poundbury Green Build Show at the Dorset Skills Centre where he’ll be offering the chance to win a free consultation if you sign up to his blog.

To read more about someone who knows a bit about how to make a house energy fit head here. Stephen Beech of Beech properties beat Cost Coffee and John Lewis to win The Best Energy Efficient Refurbishment Award at the prestigious Environment and Energy Awards.