Fall in UK Wall Cladding Retrofit Market Predicted

Although the wall cladding market has been healthy for the last few years, the ending of the CERT programme is expected to have an impact in terms of grant funding in the residential retrofit sector following the Grenfell tragedy due to the decline in the uptake of external wall insulation (EWI). The ECO programme was introduced to replace source funding yet has not been as successful in either scope or uptake.

The residential retrofit sub-sector is predicted to continue to decline over the next two years, which will affect the figures (shown in the graph – fig 1) significantly across the whole wall cladding sector.

The commercial wall cladding sub-sector is still increasing in terms of new work and RMI output, with the largest customers in warehousing, sports facilities and data centres.

Rainscreen cladding

The demand for rainscreen cladding has increased significantly and has made it one of the fastest-growing sub-sectors of the industry. The largest uptake has been in office buildings, but there has been a noticeable rise in demand for rainscreen cladding techniques and materials in residential high-rise blocks.

New materials, such as EPDM for waterproofing barrier layers in wall cladding is also on the increase.