Feeds:
Posts
Comments

Archive for the ‘SAP’ Category

liquid biofuel CHP: officially renewable or not?

Posted in agriculture, biofuel, biomass, chp, climate change, Code for Sustainable Homes, DER Calculation, energy, engineering, london, renewable energy, SAP, stamp duty exemption, sustainability, tagged , , , , on July 25, 2008| Leave a Comment »

Love them or hate them, liquid biofuels are increasingly being put forward as a renewable fuel for CHP. Currently they’re eligible for ROCs and so appear to be considered renewable by BERR and OFGEM.

But when I spoke to the SAP team at BRE, not only did they confirm that liquid biofuels aren’t considered under SAP, they also said that “because of mounting doubts over the extent of emissions from biofuels”, you have to use the emissions factor for oil when carrying out your SAP calcs. Did they expect the treatment of biofuels to change for the 2010 review of SAP? Adamantly, they did not.

Then I called the BREEAM helpline. They told me that liquid biofuels also aren’t considered under the Code for Sustainable Homes. So no help in scoring points under ENE1 or ENE7.

So liquid biofuel CHP is eligible for ROCs but will do little for your Part L and Code requirements. Without achieving these requirements, the case for biofuel CHP for new buildings is severely undermined. Obviously this situation could change. With CLG on the lookout for ways to meet the 2016 zero carbon homes target, there might be considerable pressure applied in favour of making biofuel renewable under SAP. But for now the official line is that biofuels are not a solution for carbon reduction in new build.

Read Full Post »

no Code 6 without MVHR

Posted in climate change, Code for Sustainable Homes, energy, engineering, renewable energy, SAP, sustainability, tagged , , , , , , on June 6, 2008| 8 Comments »

For a while, I have suspected that the thermal efficiency requirements for Code 6 would almost certainly require MVHR. But I was always dimly aware that I hadn’t actually done the numbers and so couldn’t be sure. Now I am: no MVHR means no Code 6.

(more…)

Read Full Post »

using new schemes to decarbonise existing buildings

Posted in biomass, chp, climate change, Code for Sustainable Homes, energy, engineering, london, renewable energy, SAP, sustainability, utilities, wind turbines, tagged , , , on May 1, 2008| 4 Comments »

If you build to Passivhaus standard, there’s no point in putting in a wet heating system. In fact, the key to the economics of Passivhaus design is that a conventional heating system is rendered redundant: you’re supposed to use the resulting savings to help fund the efficiency measures. Instead of a boiler and radiators you might only need a small electric heating coil in your mechanical ventilation system.

Level 6 of the Code for Sustainable Homes is modelled on the Passivhaus standard. As a result, until the Code changes, you’re likely to see more and more developers trying to move towards electric heating systems. You might argue that given the quantities of electricity we’re talking about (15 kWh/m2.yr), even if you source the electricity from the grid, it’s no carbon catastrophe. Unless you consider the bigger picture.

Making new buildings zero carbon is an excellent requirement, but by focusing our efforts (and a hell of a lot of money) on ratcheting down the heat demand from new buildings, we throw away the huge opportunity of using new developments to slash emissions from existing stock. (more…)

Read Full Post »

CHP and SAP – part II

Posted in chp, climate change, Code for Sustainable Homes, DER Calculation, energy, engineering, other stuff, SAP, sustainability, utilities, tagged , on March 20, 2008| 6 Comments »

I’ve been spending some quality time with spreadsheets and have an update on the way building regs for housing treats CHP. It’s not as simple as I thought here, although the result is similar. The incorrect method I wrote about a few weeks back is still in use, but it’s different from what’s happening in SAP 2005. Here’s a breakdown:

(more…)

Read Full Post »

Communal Wind Turbines and SAP

Posted in climate change, DER Calculation, energy, renewable energy, SAP, stamp duty exemption, wind turbines on March 14, 2008| 3 Comments »

Following on from here, I have been chasing BRE & CLG to clarify the situation. The sorry response is that no-one was really aware of the potential implications of this piece of policy. So it’s official, at this point it is not possible to include the power output from communal on-site wind turbines, even where connected via a private wire network.

I have been tasked by Ted King, Head of Building Regs at CLG, to formally write to all stakeholders highlighting the issues so that they can be considered (not necessarily resolved) during the revisions for SAP 2009/10 for the next Part L update. The good news is that this work is already underway to be ready for the consultation process in January 2009. So, no comfort for my client, but perhaps others will be able to avoid this.

For what it’s worth, I also contacted the BWEA to check whether they were aware of the situation, and no they were not but obviously very interested to make sure that their industry is not penalised in this manner in the future.

Read Full Post »

« Newer Posts

Design a site like this with WordPress.com
Get started