Smarter Strategies for the Retrofit Revolution

With 30 million UK homes and thousands of commercial buildings needing upgrades before 2050, retrofit is now a race against time. At the 2025 CIBSE Technical Symposium, four peer-reviewed papers revealed practical frameworks that can turbo-charge delivery. Below we unpack each study showing how  VEXO’s own products slot neatly into the picture.

Prioritising By Archetype: Whole-House Wins

Dr May Zune’s team modelled fourteen South-Yorkshire house types and compared fabric-only, systems-only and combined packages. They found that: 

  • Whole-house “fabric-first, systems-second” retrofits yield the deepest long-term carbon cuts. 
  • Retrofitting older, larger Victorian & Georgian homes first gives the biggest stock-level pay-off, even if deployment rates stay modest. 
  • Stock-level planning must link archetype maps with socio-economic data to direct funding to fuel-poor streets. 

Take-away for estates teams: segment your portfolio by size, age and form-factor, then sequence projects on carbon return-on-investment, not just EPC ratings. 

"Baseline" vs "Fabric + Systems" Retrofit

Hospitals & Multi-Criteria Decision-Making

Kubra Doguc et al. tackled some of the UK’s most energy-hungry buildings: deep-plan tower hospitals (DPTHs). Using an Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) with NHS stakeholders plus simulation-based optimisation, they produced retrofit bundles that balance: 

  • Energy & carbon reduction 
  • Life-cycle cost 
  • Clinical disruption risk 

Stakeholder input sharpened results and delivered robust, reality-checked solutions for HVAC, façade and lighting upgrades. 

Action point: involve end-users early; their weightings can swing the optimal package by double-digit percentages. 

Analytical Hierarchy Process - AHP Results

Moisture-Risk Management for Suspended Timber Floors 

Millions of pre-1919 homes still have uninsulated suspended timber floors (STFs). Apostolos Evangelopoulos presented the MRAM framework—a combined Risk-Map + 3-D Risk-Matrix that assigns a Key Risk Indicator (KRI) to every moisture pathway before insulation is installed. 

  • KRI = Likelihood × Severity × Detection. 
  • Empirical data continually refines rankings, turning MRAM into a dynamic decision tool. 
  • Floors deemed “safe” can then be robot-spray-insulated, unlocking large embodied-carbon savings. 

Specifier tip: add MRAM to your PAS 2035 risk-register to avoid post-retrofit damp claims. 

Mosture risk in residential buildings

Retrofit Vision 2050: A Digital “North Star” for Portfolios 

Commercial landlords can feel paralysed by clashing targets. The Mace team built a single-source-of-truth platform that layers CRREM carbon pathways, asset data and CAPEX/OPEX forecasting into a live dashboard. Results so far: 

  • 500,000 t CO₂e of identified client savings. 
  • A four-stage Discover–Design–Develop–Deliver workflow aligned to PAS 2038. 
  • Quick-win optimisations (“easy wins”) secure early buy-in while deeper projects queue up. 

Portfolio insight: mapping stranding risk visually helps boardrooms unlock funding three times faster. 

MACE - North Star

How VEXO accelerates every strategy 

Ready to design a smarter retrofit? 

Whether you’re planning an archetype-led housing scheme, upgrading an NHS estate, tackling moisture-risk floors, or steering a multi-asset net-zero roadmap – VEXO can help. 

Contact our technical team or book a product demo of X-POT, Y-MAG and S-BMS.

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