Overview of Sun-X

Sun-X is one of Britain’s oldest established window film and blinds specialists, holding a Royal Warrant as suppliers and installers of ultraviolet filters and traditional blinds. Based in Bognor Regis on the south coast, the team installs nationwide, travelling to all four corners of the UK, with enquiries increasingly arriving from Europe too. Sun-X has been a trusted name in the heritage building sector for decades, working on everything from listed museums to five-star hotels and even a museum in Denmark.

The core technology has a remarkable origin. Solar window film was developed in the late 1970s as an offshoot of the space race, originally used to keep glare off astronauts’ visors before it was realised how effectively it reflected heat. Nearly fifty years on, that same proven principle is helping buildings cut energy consumption, running costs and carbon emissions.

The challenge

Heating, cooling and ventilation systems are responsible for over 50% of carbon emissions in non-domestic buildings, and their performance is heavily influenced by the building’s glazing. Heat loss through glazing can account for around 25% of a building’s heating requirement, while solar heat gain through glazing can account for around 33% of its cooling demand.

With more frequent and prolonged heatwaves, many buildings now face conditions well beyond those they were designed for. Replacing windows or installing new air conditioning is expensive, disruptive and carries significant embodied carbon, which makes retrofit solutions an increasingly attractive alternative.

The Low-E window film solution

Sun-X’s market-leading Low-E (low emissivity) window film is retrofitted to existing glazing. It reflects excess solar heat away in summer and radiant heat back into the room in winter, a true ‘all-season’, always-on solution that can reduce total building energy consumption, often by more than 10%.

• Reduces solar energy by up to 73% and UV transmission by over 99%, protecting occupants, fabrics and furnishings
• Improves single-glazing U-values by up to 28% (5.8 down to as low as 4.19)
• Faster cost-payback than replacing windows, with ROI in as little as 2 years and typically 3 to 5 years
• Available in finishes from highly mirrored to completely clear and non-reflective, suitable for listed and heritage buildings
• A more temperate environment year-round, supporting productivity, reducing absenteeism and glare-related eye strain, with added benefits including one-way daytime privacy and improved shatter resistance
  

The results in practice

Voco St David’s, Cardiff (IHG Hotel Group)

Extensive south-facing glazing across every floor of this iconic 5* hotel left rooms overheating so severely that the HVAC system couldn’t keep them cool, costing the hotel both reputation and revenue in guest compensation. Following Sun-X’s Low-E film installation in 2022, air-conditioning usage roughly halved and winter heating costs fell noticeably too. Rooms are now comfortable year-round, curtains stay open to the views over Cardiff Bay, and the building has gained a smart, uniform external appearance.

Oxford University Museum of Natural History

Excessive sunlight through a vast expanse of pyramid roof glazing was causing overheating and UV damage, affecting both visitors and the museum’s internationally significant collections. In 2017, Sun-X applied a clear, non-reflective film that reduces heat and UV across thousands of glass roof tiles. It now blocks more than half the sun’s heat and virtually all UV radiation while letting daylight through, a discreet result in keeping with the building’s celebrated neo-Gothic character.

Performance data

Beyond window film

Sun-X offers a wider suite of retrofit energy-saving solutions. Roller blinds, manufactured and installed by Sun-X, reduce solar glare and can cut winter heat loss by up to a third. For gas, retrofit boiler solutions improve combustion and firing efficiency, with reported savings on gas usage and returns typically seen within a year and a half. For electricity, an optimiser fitted to the mains supply installs in a couple of hours and delivers guaranteed savings on the electricity bill, with payback usually within the first year.

Leading by example with NCZ Silver Certification

Sun-X practises what it promotes, having been through the certification process itself. As an NCZ Silver Certified business, all of Sun-X’s Scope 1, 2 and 3 organisational emissions have been independently assessed and reported through the NCZ certification programme, establishing a complete carbon footprint baseline for the business.

This certification matters in two ways. It demonstrates credibility, because the energy and carbon savings Sun-X promises its clients are grounded in the same rigorous measurement discipline it applies to its own operations. It also delivers direct value to customers. For organisations measuring their own footprint, choosing a certified supplier means the products and services they procure come from a business whose emissions are transparently measured and managed, supporting their Scope 3 supply-chain reporting and strengthening the integrity of their own path to net zero.

Why this matters on the journey to net zero

Retrofit efficiency measures deliver immediate cost and carbon savings without the embodied emissions of new manufacture. In many cases, improving the performance of the glazing, boiler and electrical systems a building already has, until they reach end of life, is the lower-carbon choice compared with premature replacement. For organisations working through the NCZ certification programme, Sun-X’s solutions offer measurable Scope 1 and 2 reductions with rapid, verifiable returns, and Sun-X can provide a full energy analysis calculating potential energy, cost and carbon savings using building modelling software, alongside a professional nationwide installation service.