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A revolutionary house which generates more energy than it consumes has been built in Wales.

The walls of the building, which was designed and constructed by the Welsh School of Architecture, collect and store thermal and electrical energy.

Located at Stormy Down, near Bridgend, the building also has a photo voltaic (solar panel) roof system and has been funded through the Low Carbon Research Institute (LCRI) programme funded by Wales European Funding Office (WEFO).

It has LED lighting, low-carbon cement, high levels of insulation and innovative hot water heat storage. High-tech wall panels also store external heat from the air.

For eight months of the year, it will produce more energy than it consumes.

Over the course of a year, every £100 spent on electricity will be balanced by £175 in energy exported back to the national grid.

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Professor Phil Jones, chair of Architecture Science at the Welsh School of Architecture, Cardiff, said their aim was to develop the technology so it could become as cheap as normal housebuilding.

The house took just 16 weeks to build and cost £1,000 per square metre - meaning the three-bedroom house cost £125,000 to build.

Average house-building costs for a good-quality home are similar.

Prof Jones said: "Our intention is to demonstrate that you can build this sort of house which generates more energy than it uses at a cost comparable to standard house construction and using off the shelf technology.

“And there’s no reason why we can’t build every building like this.

“It is important we do this at a price people, local authorities and house builders can afford."

Watch the construction of the Solcer House in pictures and video

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Solar power is key to how the house works

The Solcer House has a PV (photo voltaic) roof system, not PV bolted on to a roof, and the wall is a thermal energy generator from the sun which collects thermal and electrical energy and stores it.

The demands of the building are then reduced and the house does not need radiators.

“When the sun is out we use the sun for heat and electricity, we store it so it can used at night,” Prof Jones said.

“In that way it is an energy positive building.”

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High-tech components

Prof Jones and his team have worked closely with industry - with Tata Steel on solar air collectors and other steel elements in the building.

Work has also been undertaken with NSG Pilkington as there are high performance glazings which encapsulate the PV system and the PV system is encapsulated in glass.

BASF manufactures insulation material and the building, which is manufactured for a SIPS (structural insulated panel system) panel system, comprising two layers of wood containing thermal insulation.

These major industries see these products as future markets and like the idea of approaching the building as a system and no longer components bolted together.

“Instead we combine the components into a system with renewable energy supply, reduced energy demand and energy storage,” Prof Jones said.

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The Cardiff team has also worked with Specific at Swansea and other university partners on ideas involving buildings as power stations.

“We have also worked quite closely with local supply chains so all the parts of the house have been built locally,” Prof Jones explained.

“Lots of local supply chains have been involved and they have benefited from this by developing skills they can use elsewhere and we have learnt from local suppliers about how to integrate their technologies into the building.

“So it has been a great partnership not only with the big international companies but with supply chains as well.”

A partnership of six universities

Set up to build research capacity in Wales for energy low carbon, the Institute is made up of six university partners including Cardiff University, of South Wales, Aberystwyth, Glyndwr, Bangor and Swansea Universities.

Professor Jones said: “We have been looking at all aspects of energy-low carbon.

“At Cardiff University we have examined the built environment with our engineering school looking at gas turbine research.

“Swansea University has focused on marine and power electronics, the University of South Wales has looked at hydrogen, Glyndwr and Bangor universities have looked at PV solar energy and Aberystwyth University at bio energy. So we have been working together across these subjects.”

With the first funding period drawing to a close Professor Jones paid tribute to the involvement of the Higher Education Funding Council WEFO, the research councils, European frameworks and industry.

“We have had a lot of funding, probably around £80m over the last six years,” he said.

The built environment, Prof Jones explained had been looking at several things such as the use of Welsh timber, developing products with Tata and collecting energy on building facades and designing buildings as well.

He said: “We designed the sustainable building envelope centre at Shotton and built that to exhibit some of the technologies we have been developing.

“More recently we built the Solcer House which is a house that generates more energy than it consumes.

“It is the idea of a house becoming a power station so buildings of the future will not just consume energy but generate it.”

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The launching of Solcer House has generated interest from governments, house builders, manufacturers, local authorities and the Welsh Government.

On the domestic front work has been undertaken at a number of Retrofits on houses in the valleys where the same kind of technology has been applied, where ever possible, to improve existing housing by reducing energy demand and fuel poverty.

Prof Jones said: “We are also undertaking retrofits at an affordable cost.