Adapting to a changing world is a key priority and in 2024 we continued to look for new products, new services and new materials that can drive our business forward. Our innovative approach and use of new technologies and sustainable solutions has helped us to deliver projects that meet and exceed our customer’s expectations while also reducing emissions, waste and environmental impact.
Here we look at some of the innovative products and services we offer to help us identify and tackle some of the key barriers for our customers, helping to accelerate their path to net zero and reducing the climate impacts of their buildings.
Energy Synergy®
We developed our Energy Synergy® process to help our customers to optimise in-use building performance, thereby reducing their carbon footprint and saving money on energy bills and lifecycle costs. Energy Synergy® monitors all building energy uses, including heating, cooling and a range of environmental data to optimise building performance and user comfort. By comparing the building’s projected energy usage with the actual energy performance providing real-time verification for customers, our customers are able to identify and resolve issues immediately and to optimise controls, systems and usage.
At the end of 2024, Energy Synergy® was in use on 14 sites with 60% showing no performance gap after 12 months. Through real-time measurement of energy performance over 2-3 years we can help customer to reduce energy use, driving down carbon emissions and energy bills.
At Hollycroft Primary School the Energy Synergy® process has helped to minimise energy consumption, reduce carbon emissions and drive down operational costs. Since completion in 2023 for Leicestershire County Council, Energy Synergy® has played a critical role monitoring of real-time data at Hollycroft, such as room temperatures, hot water usage, and overall energy consumption to enable them to identify and address inefficiencies.
In terms of carbon savings, the use of Energy Synergy® has already identified 2,216 kgCO2e of emission reductions from the running of the building, with projections suggesting the savings will be 5,652kgCO2e every year. That is the equivalent emissions to more than five flights from London to New York, or nearly 400 car journeys from Hinckley to Birmingham every year. During the first six months of the second year of operation 77% of these savings have been realised with efficiencies in the heating system.
Gaining a detailed understanding of building performance has enabled Leicestershire County Council to deliver carbon savings in support of their 2045 net zero target and realise cost savings while enhancing the comfort and wellbeing of students and staff at Hollycroft Primary School.
Residential Monitoring
We also offer customers a range of building performance monitoring options for residential projects. Measuring, verifying and improving performance of multi dwelling residential buildings is complex. We can use smart meter and sub-meter data to capture the real-life energy consumption from within a household. Residential monitoring enables customers and stakeholders to analyse and understand actual energy performance and to make changes that can reduce fuel bills, which in turn can help tackle fuel poverty.
We have developed a mix of external partnerships and in-house solutions to provide a range of different solutions which meet different customer needs. We envisage in future all Net Zero Carbon in Operation (NZCiO) projects will require verification, with both Residential Monitoring and Energy Synergy® configured to help customers to comply with future standards.
In 2024, projects using Residential Monitoring include Block D, part of a £38m development of affordable homes for Hounslow Council (below).
Collida
Collida is Willmott Dixon’s internal design and standardisation house.
We have a wealth of experience across a number of sectors, working with a wide range of customers to deliver different superstructure types. Building upon this expertise, the Collida team focus on creating standard designs, ranging from 1:5 details, modelled with robust Psi-values, also known as thermal bridge loss coefficients, to fully designed platforms to be deployed where we have customers with recurring specifications and requirements - for example, on the Department for Education framework.
Collida was integral to the Passivhaus-certified Palomar Court apartment block, part of Barking and Dagenham Council’s regeneration of the Gascoigne neighbourhood in East London. Here, a design-for-manufacture approach simplified the build and reduced embodied carbon from the project by using light gauge steel panels and a light gauge steel frame along with precast low-carbon concrete. Certified by the Passivhaus Institute, in 2024, Palomar Court (below) achieves the highest levels of airtightness ever completed by Willmott Dixon.
Decarbonise Today
Decarbonise Today provides a true end-to-end delivery solution, turning net zero goals into measurable decarbonisation projects. From estate-wide assessments and investment-grade proposals to securing external funding and managing delivery on the ground, we provide customers with a clear decarbonisation pathway, maximising carbon reductions, cost efficiencies, and long-term sustainability.
In 2024, we supported North Hertfordshire District Council’s drive towards net zero carbon in operation by 2030, with a successful application to the Public Sector Decarbonisation Scheme (PSDS3c) securing £7.76m in external funding to deliver low carbon improvement works across three leisure centres, including external wall and roof insulation, glazing upgrades, air source heat pumps and heat recovery systems.
Other customers supported by Decarbonise Today include Gloucestershire Constabulary, where 22 heat decarbonisation plans and 29 building surveys have been completed, identifying targeted solutions and investment requirements, providing a clear, costed route to net zero. At East Kent College Group, we secured £302,250 through the Low Carbon Skills Fund to drive forward detailed RIBA Stage 4 design at their Canterbury Campus, and at Arun District Council, we created robust, costed heat decarbonisation plans for Arun Civic Centre and Bognor Regis Town Hall, providing a carbon reduction strategy, aligned to the council’s net zero ambitions.
Across both public and private sectors, Decarbonise Today supports the transformation of buildings, delivering efficient, future-ready spaces, aligned to net zero goals, driving, and delivering efficiencies, supporting emission reductions, creating sustainable buildings, adapted to meet the demands of a changing climate.
Sustainable Steel
Our commitment to a sustainable built environment drives innovation in the choice of materials we use. One key area of progress is in the sourcing of Electric Arc Furnace (EAF) steel — a lower-carbon alternative to traditional basic oxygen furnace steel (BOF) — which helps reduce embodied carbon from our customers’ projects at minimal or no extra cost or time.
EAF steel is produced at lower temperatures and uses high proportions (>90%) of scrap metal. This lower energy requirement and use of recycled material emits substantially less CO₂ than conventional methods, reducing embodied carbon by up to 80% per tonne.
While EAF steel is not yet universally available for all structural sections – generally around 70-75% of the structural frame can be supplied with EAF steel. In 2024, we used EAF steel on seven projects including Leighton Linslade Leisure Centre, Royal Liberty School and Queen Mary University London. Analysis from Hastings High School showed use of EAF steel saved 190 tonnes of carbon, while at Chichester STEM, we saved 462 tonnes of carbon by using an EAF steel to create the building’s frame (below).
Offsite construction/Modern Methods of Construction (MMC)
At Willmott Dixon, we use MMC to save time and cost, while improving quality and promoting greater sustainability. We have extensive experience of off-site construction, prefabrication, and modular construction, working with trusted supply chain partners who fabricate the product components in factories, and specialist contractors who have the expertise to assemble them on site.
In 2024, key components manufactured off-site include light gauge steel frames, with windows and EPDM roofing installed, factory assembled bathrooms and prefabricated and precast concrete.
At the Indigo development in Peterborough for Cross Keys Homes, we have made use of innovative construction methods learned through our Perry Barr Residential Scheme. This approach to deliver efficiency savings through offsite manufacturing will make up around 63% of the project's value while minimising embodied carbon. Elements that will be manufactured offsite include a light-gauge steel frame, brick slips and bathroom pods.
Digital Construction
We are a digital-first business, enabling our people and partners to deliver value and quality through innovation and technology. Our people harness technology to drive efficiencies for our customers, helping us work in a more sustainable way, making our projects even safer and our delivery more agile and responsive.
Willmott Dixon employs an ISO 19650-certified digital ecosystem that spans the entire company, enabling seamless collaboration between our people, supply partners and of course, our customers. We are the first to achieve companywide BRE Global BIM Level 2 Certification for use across our entire construction, residential and interiors activities.
We apply Building Information Modelling (BIM), a holistic, data-driven approach, based on 3D digital modelling, where a virtual model created during design forms a digital representation of the physical and the functional aspects of a building.
This allows everyone involved in the design and construction of a building to collaborate, communicate and share information seamlessly and efficiently using digital building models. Typically, BIM reduces our average programme period by 5% and helps keep budgets healthy.
At Eclipse Leisure Centre, completed in 2024, we used BIM to ensure the design could be precisely implemented as modelled to achieve Passivhaus accreditation. Here ‘clash detection’ was used to help identify where parts of the building may interfere with each other. Identifying clashes early in this way prevents disruptions, reduces rework, and enhances overall project efficiency.
The Yellow Book
Willmott Dixon’s Yellow Book is our design and build manual. It brings together our collective knowledge and resources in one place to give our people and our supply chain partners access to all our combined knowledge when it comes to designing and constructing the perfect product. The positive impact of the Yellow Book is evidenced by the quality of our end-product, a reduction in the cost of rectifying errors and ultimately reducing business risk.
Most recently, this has been coupled with the development of the Collida standard details, which package this learning into solutions that our consultants and project teams can directly deploy.