Never been a better time to insulate your home

Energy Saving Trust - 24th June 2011

With rising energy bills, there has never been a better time to improve home insulation, claims Bev Coombe, membership and communications manager for the National Insulation Association.

Highlighting the benefits of installing insulation, she said: "Householders can save around £265 every year on their energy bills by having loft and cavity wall insulation installed.

"There is also the added benefit of living in a warmer, more comfortable home- which also has a reduced environmental impact."

Meanwhile, people moving home could find that insulation will improve a property's Energy Performance Certificate (EPC) rating, which all sellers must complete and show potential buyers the energy efficiency standard of a building.

Companies still failing to comply with Air Conditioning Inspection Legislation

eatoutmagazine.co.uk - 10th June 2011

All UK buildings with air conditioning systems that have a capacity of over 12kW should have been inspected for energy efficiency by 4 January 2011.

The Heating and Ventilating Contractors' Association (HVCA) has received information from the Department for Communities and Local Government which indicates that many have not yet been inspected and building owners are breaking the law.

Apart from the potential penalties companies face they are almost certainly paying higher energy bills by failing to have their systems inspected by experts who can advise on efficiency improvements.
Under the regulations all air conditioning systems with a cooling capacity over 12kW must be inspected.

Rod Pettigrew, deputy chief executive of the HVCA, commented: "non-compliance has a real cost; it costs the environment, it will cost the UK and chance of meeting its emissions targets and it costs companies the opportunity to lower their costs - and in the difficult trading conditions being experienced by most bus in esse that must be sufficient incentive alone.

Its worth emphasizing that the inspection is not just a tick box excercise; it gives building owners and managers useful information about how their systems are running and how they could be improved both to reduce harmful carbon emissions and save them money on their energy bills."

UK proposes Fourth Carbon Budget

Department of Energy and Climate Change - 17th May 2011

A limit on the total amount of greenhouse gasses to be emitted by the UK between 2023 to 2027 has been proposed to cut Britain's emissions by 50% from 1990 levels and highlighting the Governments commitment to being the greenest ever government.

Today's proposal, set out by Energy and Climate Change Secretary Chris Huhne, is in line with the advice from the independent committee on Climate Change. It sets a fourth carbon budget of 1950 MtCO2e for the period that will span from 2023 to 2027, putting the UK on course to cut emissions by at least 80" by 2050. The carbon budget will place the British economy at the leading edge of a new global industrial transformation and ensure low carbon energy security and decarbonisation is achieved at least cost to the consumer.

Call for EPC's to be publicly available

Energy Saving Trust - 17th May 2011

Energy Performance Certificates (EPCs) should be made publicly available so that properties failing to meet energy efficiency standards can be easily identified, the Association of Residential Letting Agents (ARLA) has stated.

Commenting on the second reading of the Energy Bill, Ian Potter, operations manager or ARLA, made the proposals as there are around 500,000 properties in the private residential sector that fall into F and G ratings for energy performance.

However, he welcomed the decision by the government to give landlords until 2018 to make green home improvements as a practical one, as poor performing buildings account for 17 per cent of the market.

Mr Potter did stress concern that there is still little detail about how properties are to be made more efficient.

"So far, there is no clarity on how energy improvements will be assessed or enforced - or, importantly, how this assessment will be funded," he said.

Other proposals in the Bill include making it illegal for landlords to refuse reasonable requests from tenants to make their property more energy efficient from April 2016.

Huhne gets tough on landlords of draughty homes

Department of Energy and Climate Change - 10th May 2011

Energy and Climate Change secretary Chris Huhne has today announced plans to introduce regulations to ensure that all landlords would face minimum energy efficiency standards under the Green Deal Plan.

Under the proposals, announced at Second Reading of the Energy Bill:

From April 2016 landlords will not be able to refuse reasonable requests from tenants or local authorities acting on behalf of tenants, to improve their property;

From April 2018 the government will make it unlawful to rent out a house or business premise which has less than an "E" energy efficiency rating, ensuring at least 682,000 properties will have to be improved.

The Green Deal is the coalitions national plan of home improvements to make house and businesses cheaper to run through better energy efficiency, From next year people will be able to access finance to pay for the upfront cost of work which will be paid back through savins on lower fuel bills.

Air Conditioning Inspection Reports must be lodged on national register

racplus.com - 3rd May 2011

From 1 July 2011, all Air Conditioning Inspection Reports produced for systems in England, Wales and Northern Ireland will need to be lodged on the national register. All systems with an effective rated output over 12kW need to be inspected.

There are tens of thousands of air conditioning systems used in England Wales and Northern Ireland. The great majority are of more than 12kW rated output and they should all have been inspected by 5th January 2011 (or within 5 years if installed after 1st January 2008, and slightly different dates apply in Northern Ireland).

Yet some landlords and occupiers just aren't bothering with inspections. Inevitably some systems are using more energy than they need, without delivering effective cooling to the end users.

The introduction of mandatory lodgement is a good opportunity to make clients aware of this new requirement, reminding them that they have a duty to have systems inspected and encourage them to get on and do it. For those that think its a burden, not a benefit, then they might be interested in recent case studies which show how they can pay for themselves within months.

Revamped EPC to be launched

estateagenttoday.co.uk - 20th April 2011

A revamped EPC is being worked by government advisers and is set to be implemented early next year.

The revamp will follow a raft of changes due to implemented in two stages, on July 1 and October 1.
If the October 1 proposed change goes through, it should mean agents not having ti print forests of extra pages as had been feared.

The October 1 proposal is that the full EPC - not just the ratings - will have to be printed and attached to all particular. However, all the associated recommendations will not have to be attached. This would mean that agents would have to add one more double sided A4 page to their particulars.
There is likely to be one crucial change. Denis purshouse, senior civil servant at CLG who advises on housing matters, said that for the purpose of EPCs attached to property particulars, the address of the property will not be included.