Building Briefs – October 14th

Europe’s largest granite quarry Glensanda recently celebrated the completion of a new £30 million upgrade of its operation and secured 500 Scottish jobs for the next 25 years.

Aggregate Industries, owner of the Scottish Highlands quarry and supplier of high quality crushed granite to markets across Europe, has cemented its place as a valuable exporting businesses for Scotland thanks to the ongoing investment at the site. Accounting for close to 100 per cent of all aggregate exported from Britain and one of the UK’s top 15 tonnage ports, the latest investment has resulted in the construction of a new primary crushing machine and a new tunnel for transporting the material from the site and onto waiting vessels for export by sea.

To mark Glensanda’s important role within the local economy and its international role as a provider of construction materials - exporting as far as Tampa, USA, and the Baltic states - Aggregate Industries recently invited local dignitaries, members of the community and key customers to view the new facilities and gain an insight into one of the world’s largest single quarry operations. The event saw guests witness a rock blast, enjoy a tour of the quarry and view the pride of the company’s logistics operations, one of its purpose-built, self-discharging bulk vessels.

UK concrete pumping firm ceases trading

One of the UK’s biggest concrete pumping firms, Professional Concrete Pumping, has ceased trading.

The firm stopped trading yesterday and has told customers no machines will be going to site and no new orders can be placed.

The firm, originally known as Pochin Concrete Pumping until it was sold in a “distressed sale” in July 2012, describes itself as the only concrete pumping company with national coverage.

Jobs the firm was working on include Skankska’s £191m M1 junction 19 improvement project, where it was supplying all mobile and static concrete pumps.

Work nears completion on Dundee NHT homes

Work is almost complete on the first new homes to be built in Dundee under the National Housing Trust (NHT) Initiative.

A total of 15 two bedroom flats at Sandy Loan, Broughty Ferry will provide homes at affordable rents for people in lower paid employment.

With completion expected by the end of the year the flats will be let by Northern Housing, part of the Hillcrest Group.

Work on the flats started in March in a new street at Churchill Place/East Links Place, named Sandy Loan following a consultation with the community.

The properties are being built to high energy efficiency levels and will benefit from lower energy costs with heating being provided by air source heat pumps.

Meanwhile householders in Dundee’s Graham Street can look forward to lower fuel bills this winter after a programme of external wall insulation was completed.

Bringing together funding from the Scottish Government’s Home Energy Efficiency Programme for Scotland and working in partnership with SSE, Dundee City Council has insulated 240 homes.

External insulation 108 homes in Arklay Street at a cost of £638,000 was approved by the local authority’s housing committee last month. The council is making a £183,962 contribution to the works at Arklay Street with the remainder coming from a £2.4 million grant from the Scottish Government’s Home Energy Efficiency Programme. Up to 600 more tenanted and owned properties across the city will also benefit as part of the programme this financial year.

Glasgow residents turn homes into research labs

Residents in the East End of Glasgow are turning their homes into research labs to help others cut their energy bills.

Tenants in the ‘steel estate’ in Sandyhills have had small sensors fitted in their homes to measure the benefits of different types of insulation in hard to heat homes.

Shettleston Housing Association has teamed up with Future City Glasgow and Strathclyde University to carry out the study which aims to identify the most effective ways to cut heating bills for people in older, poorly insulated properties.

Shettleston HA has been cladding tenants’ properties on the estate and helping owner occupiers access grants to have their own homes done. However, the work has had to be halted due to changes to ECO (Energy Company Obligation) grants.

Councillor Gordon Matheson, Leader of Glasgow City Council and Chair of Future City Glasgow, has written to Chancellor George Osborne protesting at changes to ECO funding which will stall insulation projects, lead to higher bills for residents and threaten jobs.

Now Future City Glasgow has fitted small sensors in the homes of tenants and owners on the steel estate to measure humidity and temperature indoors and compare it with conditions outdoors. Some of the test properties have been fitted with external insulation but others have not had the work carried out.

Data collected by the sensors is being analysed by researchers at Strathclyde University. The information gathered will be used to show which insulation provides the biggest improvements in energy efficiency and living conditions.

The team will go on to work with other housing associations including GHA to monitor the benefits of different types of insulation in properties of different construction.

Sheltered housing residents benefit from new kitchens

Hundreds of residents in two Renfrewshire Council sheltered housing complexes are enjoying brand new kitchen facilities thanks to Keepmoat.

Residents living in Fulbar Court, in Renfrew, and Houston Court, in Johnstone, both received kitchen revamps as part of the community benefit element of the Scottish Housing Quality Standard (SHQS) improvement programme.

As part of the council’s SHQS programme, contractors working with the council also commit to supporting local communities wherever possible.

The work was carried out by Keepmoat, one of the main contractors working on the council’s £138 million SHQS programme. Since the programme began in 2010, Keepmoat has installed more than 3,000 new kitchens in council tenants’ homes.

The sheltered housing upgrades included a fully improved kitchen, full redecoration, painting and flooring.

Over 80,000 more homes to enjoy superfast broadband boost

More than 80,000 homes and businesses in 67 locations across Scotland are to benefit from fibre broadband in the latest phase of the £410 million Digital Scotland Superfast Broadband programme.

The locations, from Wick and Thurso in Caithness to Maybole and Tarbolton in South Ayrshire, are spread across 13 Scottish local authority areas. The first premises in these locations are expected to benefit from fibre broadband during Spring 2015.

The programme will reach 15 new communities in the Highlands and Islands, extending into Caithness for the first time. The West of Scotland also gets a big boost, with more than 40,000 premises across the city of Glasgow, Renfrewshire, Ayrshire, Lanarkshire and Dunbartonshire set to benefit.

Most places – such as Aberdour, Ballachulish, Banchory, Bishopbriggs, Dalmally, and Govan – will receive high speed technology for the first time, while others will see additional premises connected as a result of building upon their existing, or planned, fibre broadband networks.