Bill Watts
BA MSc CEng FCIBSE

Senior Partner

I joined Max Fordham 30 years ago, so I've been working in the construction industry for a long time; I understand how buildings work, and perhaps more importantly, I've seen how they don't work.

Changing legislation and fashions means there are many confused requirements for sustainability. Max Fordham have been at the forefront of sustainable design for over three decades, the breadth of experience I've built up means I've seen all the innovative approaches before and understand potential limitations as well as the real solutions. The commercial environment has changed recently, sustainability is now a requirement rather than an desirable option and it's not a very well defended field. The benefit of my experience helps clients find way through it with solutions appropriate to their requirements.

Energy consumption is a significant cost to any client, both financially and in terms of the longevity of their building and that's important, but no one will use a building if it's not comfortable. I meet with clients in the early stages of a project and help to establish their needs. The aim is to produce design solutions which might be innovative, but are always appropriate.

I believe that there are a number of concepts which provide answers our energy issues though they are not currently sufficiently developed in terms of research to bring to a project. I'm leading the development of the practice's skills to a point where this innovation and cutting edge technology can be delivered to clients at acceptable level of risk and working with architects to bring new energy concepts in line with in line with the architecture. Designing buildings is a great intellectual challenge for an engineer, no building's principle purpose is to be sustainable so the real challenge is to make them safe, efficient and functional with longevity in mind.