Renew 175 out now: Retrofits in the APY Lands, right to repair, soft plastics recycling, EV charger visibility, dealing with floods, rentals and sustainability, and much more!

In Renew 175, we step inside “The Straw House” – one of the homes featured in this year’s Sustainable House Day – to see how a community in Denmark, Western Australia came together to help neighbours Brenna and Charlie build their dream strawbale and cob earth home.

For our in-conversation, we sit down with Amanda Cahill, founder of The Next Economy, to hear about her recent experience at COP30 in Brazil and get a sense of what she’s seeing on the ground as regional communities navigate the transition.

We head to the APY Lands in remote South Australia to learn how a pioneering retrofit project is improving thermal comfort in homes facing extreme conditions, while generating insights that could inform climate-resilient housing across Australia.

And we examine Australia’s rental reality, where rising costs collide with cold, inefficient and often unhealthy homes, leaving many households without the ability to improve their living conditions.

With extreme weather event becoming more frequent, we look at how to best prepare, with practical guidance on improving indoor air quality during bushfires and minimising damage and recovery time after flooding.

We then visit some of Australia’s repair cafes and get to know the volunteers keeping things working in our throwaway economy, and welcome the return of soft plastics recycling systems – learning what it will take to turn collected material into viable, widely used products.

For those with an EV, or considering purchasing one, we look at what’s happening with Australia’s public charging networks and get to know a promising solution for households without a driveway. Plus, our resident EV expert Bryce Gaton takes the fully electric KGM Musso dual-cab ute for a test drive.

Finally, we explore simple plug-in battery backup systems and the rise of sodium-ion batteries, alongside the often-overlooked benefits of rooftop solar and the growing role of imperfect produce in reducing food waste and supporting seasonal eating.