What is the NextGeneration Initiative?
NextGeneration is the sustainability
benchmarking system for UK homebuilders.
NextGeneration enables homebuilders, government, registered providers, investors,
employees, and the public to understand the sustainability of benchmarked homebuilders’
operations and the new homes they build. It also sets out what good practice looks like
and drives change in the industry, with the criteria of the benchmarks being publicly
available. They assess homebuilders, not on whether they are meeting minimum
standards and mandatory disclosures, but going beyond these requirements.
Our History
The NextGeneration initiative was originally developed in 2006 to build upon the successes of previous benchmarking exercises undertaken by insight Investment and WWF UK. The NextGeneration Benchmark was designed for assessing the corporate sustainability of the largest homebuilders in the UK, but recently the service offering has expanded to support all homebuilder across the UK, regardless of size, improve their sustainability performance.
THE EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE
NEXTGENERATION SERVICES
NextGeneration offers a range of services that are suitable for different homebuilder sizes and sustainability
journey stages; NextGeneration Benchmark, NextGeneration Core & NextGeneration Project.
NEXTGENERATION BENCHMARK
25 largest homebuilders in the UK alongside
any voluntary participants
NEXTGENERATION CORE
is an intermediate corporate sustainability
benchmark for small to mid-size homebuilders to
measure their sustainability against best practice
NEXTGENERATION PROJECT
is a project-level sustainability assessment
for a wide range of homebuilders to measure
their performance on site
NEXTGENERATION SERVICES COMPARISON
Click to view comparison table
| NG Benchmark | NextGeneration Core | NextGeneration Project | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Scope | - Corporate (i.e. company operations and developments) | - Corporate (i.e. company operations and developments) | - Individual development |
| Eligibility | - Automatically included: largest 25 homebuilders in the UK by housing turnover and legal completions OR - Voluntary participation | - Voluntary homebuilders smaller than the largest 25 in the UK | - Any voluntary homebuilder |
| Number of Criteria | - 68 criteria - 120+ sub-criteria | - 14 criteria - 18 sub-criteria | - 12 criteria but outside the first three criteria, these are optional |
| Timing | - Occurs annually, starting in April. - Homebuilders must agree membership by mid-April. | - Occurs throughout the year, but homebuilders must enter by 31st August for their results to be included in that year’s analysis | - Occurs throughout the year |
| Process Length | - 9 months | - 6 weeks minimum | - 6 weeks minimum |
| Outputs | - NextGeneration Benchmark Assessment - NextGeneration Results Presentation & Meeting | - NextGeneration Core Assessment - NextGeneration Results Meeting | - NextGeneration Project Assessment - NextGeneration Project Label |
| Awards | - The highest performing homebuilders overall receive Gold, Silver or Bronze Awards - The highest performing homebuilder in Phase 1 (based on publicly available information) receives a Crystal Award | - No awards currently available for this service. Instead, a score is provided. | - Developments receive Gold, Silver or Bronze Awards depending on the number of additional criteria they achieve - Bronze is 1+ - Silver is 4+ - Gold is 7+ |
“In a world where we need to stay below 1.5 degrees (IPCC 2018), it is more important than ever for housebuilders to be producing homes that are fit for purpose, both now and in the future. NextGeneration provides a robust benchmark of the housebuilding industry, and, crucially, helps companies consider where they must focus their efforts in order to be sustainability leaders.”
"Sustainability is a business critical issue that is rapidly changing the finance landscape for homebuilders. With an increasing number of
green loans, sustainability-linked loans and green mortgages available, the opportunity to use these mechanisms to limit global warming to 1.5°C has never been more present. Homebuilders now have more tools, knowledge, and skills at hand to transform their targets into actions; and those who make the most of these will adapt and flourish to our changing climate and sustainability landscape. The NextGeneration Initiative is one of these tools, which can help by highlighting what best practice sustainability looks like for homebuilders to deliver positive environmental and social outcomes."