Sapna is a chartered building services engineer and a qualified low carbon energy assessor with CIBSE (Chartered Institute of Building Services Engineers). She completed her undergraduate degree in Mechanical Engineering at Bristol University, since then she has worked at design consultancies including WSP, Skelly & Couch and Useful Simple Trust. Sapna has a breadth of experience developing energy models and building services designs for residential and commercial buildings. Her technical knowledge is complemented by her experience working with Local Authorities, to deliver sustainability and decarbonisation strategies, and housing developers, to design low carbon and regenerative masterplans. Sapna is a systems thinker; her curiosity and interest in wider sustainability issues such as social value, circular economy and biodiversity allow her to approach engineering problems with a unique mindset.
Future cooling scenarios to adapt UK homes for heatwaves
In July 2022, the UK saw peak temperatures exceed 40°C. The UK’s housing stock is not designed to passively reduce overheating risks. Therefore, as heatwaves become more common it is likely the UK will see an increase in active cooling across dwellings. Sapna’s research explores the emergence of cooling in the context of wider socio-technical change in the energy system as the UK moves towards a low carbon economy. Her research project will use a systems approach to develop future scenarios for the emergence of cooling. She combines a range of methods to develop these scenarios including interviews, historical analysis and building modelling. Sapna’s research is sponsored by DESNZ, her scenarios are developed with a strong policy focus to consider the variety of options, and the scale and level at which they need to occur.
