It means we just scraped past the regs but you the prospective householder can feel warmth (not literally) and wellbeing

Umm is that before or after the free 42 inch TV?

how do you spell skeptcals?

Hi,

It comes back to a point I made in another thread about perception of regulations (dodging thereof). The converse is that compliant with regulations is touted as good, if they marketed as exceeds by xyz or whatever, it would show they recognise the regs are the bare min we should accept.
Cheers

I think most will be familiar with the minimum expected in the most basic of new houses these days...

The home will have to be 25% more energy efficient than one built to the 2006
Building Regulations standards. This could be achieved by:
• Improving the thermal efficiency of the walls, windows, and roof as far as
is practically possible (by using more insulation or better glass for example);
• Reducing air permeability to the minimum consistent with health
requirements (a certain amount of air ventilation is needed in a home for
health reasons);
• Installing a high efficiency condensing boiler;
• Carefully designing the fabric of the home to reduce thermal bridging
(thermal bridging allows heat to easily escape between the inner walls
and the outer walls of a home);
• Possibly using district heating systems or low and zero carbon technologies
such as solar thermal panels or biomass boilers to help heat the hot water.
The home will have to be designed to use no more than about 105 litres of
water per person per day. This could be achieved by fitting a number of items
such as:
• 6/4 Dual Flush WC;
• Flow Reducing/Aerating taps throughout;
• 6-9 litres per minute shower (note that an average electric shower is about
6/7 litres per minute);
• a smaller, shaped bath – still long enough to lie down in, but less water
required to fill it to a level consistent with personal comfort;
• 18ltr maximum volume dishwasher;
• 60ltr maximum volume washing machine.
Other minimum requirements are required for:
• Surface water management – this may mean the provision of soakaways and
areas of porous paving;
• Materials – this means a minimum number of materials meeting at least a ‘D’
grade in the Building Research Establishment’s Green Guide (the scale goes
from A+ to E);
• Waste management – this means having a site waste management plan in place
during the home’s construction, and adequate space for waste storage during
its use.

............

But to get to Level 3 you need a further 46.7 points. So the builder/developer
must do other things to obtain the other points such as:
• Providing drying space (so that tumble dryers need not be used);
• Providing more energy efficient lighting (both internally and externally);
• Providing cycle storage;
• Providing a room that can be easily set up as a home office;
• Reducing the amount of water than runs off the site into the storm drains;
• Using much more environmentally friendly materials;
• Providing recycling capacity either inside or outside the home;
• Enhancing the security of the home;
• Enhancing the sound insulation used in the home.

...Anyone care to point me to the "complex technologies" in that last list?

I would prefer a low energy home to an energy efficient one -- a lot of educating needs to be done yet.

That's the distinction I tried to make to that rep, Tony. He just looked blankly back with an expression that made it clear he wished I'd just disappear. I had the mischief in me, but had to get on to somewhere else so had to suppress it.

Disappointing thing is that if the scheme is turned down it won't be because it falls short of what's possible and desirable.

It might still be seen by some as a selling point, but they could have mass produced UPVC 3g for the same money, so even those marketing / sales folk aren't exactly upto date. But if the buyer dosn't even know then they win. So I would like to inform the public more. Its a bit like working in an office where one bod knows how to get the whatever going (MS office / coffe machine)and when challenged always sayes Oh I thaught everyone new that - which translates to I kept that a secret.
So the more the public is informed the more they can raise their expectations.

Cheers Mike up North

I house must have an EPC (at least in England) before sale AFAIK.

I have repeatedly written to one of the larger Internet house finder that doesn't even display them, let alone let you search/filter by rating.

Rgds

Damon

No big secret I suppose: it's RightMove.

Really I think it should be forbidden in most circs to advertise a property without its energy label, and by extension I believe that it should be a filter criterion.

I hope they've added it and I'm just too stupid to find it, but I suspect that they JustDontCare(TM).

Rgds

Damon

Rightmove aren't the estate agent. They do show EPC for many of the properties. The first had the EPC at the end of the description and the second had a link to EPCregister.com a Directgov websiten which gave me a .pdf of gobbledegook but also had a link to EPC advisor which apparently can give you hints on how to improve the rating of that particular home.

That said it would be nice to have as a search option on right move and I think that would be worth campaigning for.

I've been spending a lot of time trying to choose a new car at nextgreencar.com and something along those lines would be good.

RobinB

Posted By: DamonHDI house must have an EPC (at least in England) before sale AFAIK.

It's before it is marketed for sale AFAIK (we just sold our house)

Posted By: RobinBRightmove aren't the estate agent. They do show EPC for many of the properties.

Exactly. The requirement is that the estate must have one available (actually, I think the requirement is that the appointment to get an EPC has been booked). Not much to do with Rightmove. And impossible to provide a search facility unless the agents were to correctly enter the numbers into a database. Which given their lack of ability to even list which rooms a house has consistently is probably not going to happen. Rightmove is so much better than anywhere else because of the drawn area search that I'd forgive them almost anything.

Yeah, it was. Remember the conversation over a link you'd posted to a R4 prog and I said I particularly liked the expression.

Today's You & Yours was interesting today. More or less saying what you've been banging on about for so long, that the price of energy will "have" to go up and then we all have choices to make...

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b01l02jc/You_and_Yours_Making_money_from_the_Olympics_collective_energy_buying_and_a_fair_price_for_milk/

Posted By: borpinBut they are as much use as a Chocolate Fireguard. When they did mine I asked if they were interested in the glazing units used and type of insulation etc and they said no - the software did not want this as a parameter! Utter waste of time IMHO.

No disagreement from me :)

Does GIGO = SISO?

rdSAP is the rating that is used to decide who is eligible for FITs, RHI, Green Deal ??