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Dr Dan Lash
Senior Research Fellow
Engineering
Centre for Energy and the Environment
Profile
Dan is a research scientist with a background in architecture and building physics who uses these skills to solve problems relating to energy, comfort, and impact within the built environment. Dan has a broad skillset which he applies to a range of themes, the main ones being greenhouse gas assessments and inventories, buildings, and roads.
Greenhouse Gas Assessments and Inventories
Dan has undertaken many significant strategic area-wide studies for Local Authorities (LAs) and other stakeholders. This has included DECC funded research for Plymouth City Council, strategies to reduce carbon emissions together with improving air quality for Oxford City Council, renewable energy capacity studies for East Devon District Council and Brentwood Borough Council and providing expert input into examinations in public. Dan has worked on numerous strategic carbon descent plans. He has also produced carbon inventories for many of the LAs in the region, including developing software tools to support this. Dan led on delivering a BEIS-funded project with CSE (Bristol) to develop a tool to calculate the greenhouse gas emissions of local parishes and wards. The resulting IMPACT tool is successfully used by parishes across the country.
Buildings
Dan formed part of the design team on Montgomery Primary School (winner of best building < £10 million at the CIBSE Awards), and the award-winning Bideford College acting in the role of sustainability adviser and thermal modeller. He has conducted extensive thermal modelling both to inform design decisions (energy, thermal comfort, ventilation, daylight) and to fulfil the compliance requirements of the Building Regulations. He has also been involved in numerous other building projects, including the Bicton EaRTH renewable energy training centre. Dan led Technology Strategy Board research into the impacts of climate changes at the BREEAM Outstanding Environment and Sustainability Institute building in Cornwall. Dan has also helped deliver the SHIFFT ERDF funded project (€6.4 million total budget). Dan has assisted LAs with government policy and developing planning policy and has produced several design compliance tools to help embed sustainability principles within developments. Dan has delivered workshops for building professionals to hundreds of delegates. Dan also provides expert advice e.g. on Design Review Panels or as an expert witness on Devon’s Climate Change Citizen’s Assembly. Dan is a qualified Level 5 CIBSE Low Carbon Energy Assessor, BREEAM assessor, and certified Passivhaus designer.
Roads
Dan has undertaken lifecycle assessments of many road construction projects. Dan worked closely with Devon County Council (DCC) to develop a tool to enable the greenhouse gas impact of a portfolio of road construction and maintenance projects to be quantified over their lifetime. Dan then worked with DCC to develop an online tool to capture live site data from all their road projects. ADEPT (the Association of Directors of Environment, Economy, Planning and Transport) recognised that this was the most advanced work of this type being undertaken at LA level and approached Dan and DCC to work together through the Future Highways Research Group (FHRG) to produce national standards (CCAS) for the road maintenance programmes of all local authorities. Dan was successful in supporting DCC to successfully bid for £3.7 million to the Department for Transport’s Live Labs 2 competition for a net zero road construction project on the A382 near Newton Abbot.
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