Sparks of 2026 #23: If You Don’t Measure, You Don’t Know - Monitoring
One of the most consistent truths we’ve heard while covering retrofit is that buildings are predictable. When we interviewed Colin, the Mould King, he put it simply: buildings obey physics. Moisture moves. Heat moves. Air moves. Ignore that, and problems follow. That has always been true.
What has changed is not the physics. What has changed is what we are now putting into buildings.
As retrofit accelerates, homes are receiving more complex systems, tighter fabric upgrades, new controls and new materials. That makes monitoring no longer optional. If you don’t measure what is happening after installation, you cannot know whether what you’ve installed is actually working, or working well.
This is why monitoring earns its place as a Spark.
Over the past year, we’ve seen a noticeable surge in practical monitoring tools designed specifically for retrofit, not just for research labs or large commercial buildings. These are tools intended to sit inside real homes, over time, and tell the truth about performance.
Companies like Purrmetrix, who we interviewed on our podcast, are helping connect retrofit measures to real-world outcomes by making building performance visible and understandable.
Systems such as NextSense, developed through innovation work at Camden Council and discussed on our YouTube channel, are showing how local authorities and delivery teams can track conditions inside homes over seasons, not just at handover.
This is not about technology for its own sake. This makes measures accountable.
Monitoring closes the loop between intention and reality. It tells you whether a home is actually warmer, drier and more stable after retrofit, or whether unintended consequences have crept in. It allows problems to be spotted early. It supports learning and improvement. And it provides evidence that good retrofit delivers what it promises.
As retrofit moves into an outcomes-led era, driven by health, comfort and wellbeing, monitoring becomes unavoidable. You cannot talk credibly about outcomes if you are not willing to measure them. Assumptions are no longer enough.
That is why we see monitoring as a genuine growth area heading into 2026. If you are already engaging with it, you are ahead of the curve. If you are not, now is the time to understand it. Because in the next phase of retrofit, success will not be judged by what you install, but by what actually happens afterwards.
And monitoring is how you find out.
