The Free Market has made ovens, not houses

Auckland prepares for climate change realities

Auckland’s emergency response teams are preparing for the realities of climate change, considering potentially life saving options such as leaving air conditioned libraries open for longer during heatwaves.

But when it comes to stopping climate change from getting worse, figures show our biggest city is way off target.

Aidan Milner, a hazard and warning adviser at Auckland Emergency Management, says heat has not always been top of mind for civil defence organisations, but that has changed.

He is part of a national heat reference group including scientists, the Ministry of Health and emergency managers.

“Heat is a novel hazard for the emergency management sector because we’ve traditionally focused on the likes of geohazards and utility failure but we’ve really started to realise that maybe heat is going to be a bigger problem than we anticipated here in New Zealand.”

One study Auckland Council commissioned showed built-up areas with little greenery could be 3 degrees Celsius hotter than surrounding areas.

FFS! How on earth has the reality of climate change and extreme heat not been factored into all the recent building?

Terraced houses in Auckland overheating due to poor design, demands for Building Code fix

• • Some of Auckland’s terraced houses are overheating, causing discomfort and potential health issues.
  • Large windows, poor ventilation, and lack of shade are primary causes, not insulation, experts say.
  • A resident of a house that overheats every hot day tells the Herald living in her home is like being in “an oven”.

…we’ve managed to build ovens, not houses!

How the Christ, on a burning planet, have newly built houses been so poorly designed that they are acting as ovens and dangerously over heating residents???

HOW CAN THAT HAPPEN ON A BURNING PLANET?

How can poor design turn houses into Ovens?

And what is the Minister’s bumbling response?

Oh it’s an insulation problem!

WTF?

But Penk’s speculation the stricter insulation requirements were causing overheating has been dismissed by experts who spoke to the Herald. The Green Building Council said rolling back H1 standards “goes against global best practice”.

Insulation doesn’t work that way – The Minister’s bumbling bullshit panicked response is because he’s here to deregulate the building codes when it is this exact lack of oversight that has built houses that fucking cook the people inside them!

This is why I am so cynical of ACTs Regulatory Standards Bill, we need MORE oversight and MORE State capacity to police that oversight to avoid building houses that roast the people inside them FFS!

Allowing a Corporate Body to prevent legislation based on a narrow interpretation of property rights as the only rights creates houses built that operate like ovens – that’s the fucking free market at work!

We need actual regulatory oversight and the ability to properly police that housing build to ensure homes that are heat proof, water tight and healthy!

Watching National try to respond to more mishaps caused by a lack of oversight by proposing even less oversight will be exciting.

 

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