The government’s draft Part L of the Building Regulations has good intentions, but lacks the practicality which the industry needs to make it work. We report on industry responses to the draft.

The industry’s reaction to the draft Part L Building Regulations could be summarised as: “Nice idea, but let’s have some practicality!”. While engineers, contractors, clients and institutions welcomed the draft document of Part L of the Building Regulations, which will incorporate the European Directive on Energy Performance of Buildings (EPBS), they also felt that it lacked clear guidance and on the whole leaves more questions than answers.

This is, of course, just a draft. However, at a consultation conference organised by the Directive Implementation Advisory Group (DIAG) it was difficult to see how the finished article could be tidied up to the extent which attendees of the conference felt is necessary.

If you are a regular reader of BSj , you will be familiar with most of the key points of the EPBD which will have most impact on building services: regular inspection of boilers; regular inspection of air conditioning systems; energy labelling for public buildings. It will affect existing as well as new commercial and domestic buildings. The overall aim is climate change mitigation, largely through the key tool of energy efficiency (see box overleaf).

Speaking at the conference, Phil Hope MP, minister responsible for Building Regulations in the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister (ODPM), said: “This legislation is critical for the government. The directive aims to promote the introduction of cost effective measures in new and existing buildings. There is greater potential for saving energy in our existing buildings.” This new legislation will form the backbone of the government’s Energy Efficiency Action Plan, which aims to cut 12 million tonnes of carbon by 2010.

Carbon Trust chief executive Tom Delay, said: “We are only fifteen months away from the launch of this legislation. It must appeal to a wide range of buildings in order to be effective. The construction and property industries must be able to work with it; it must be practical, pragmatic and simple.”

This is where the draft falls down. As all services engineers know, there is no simple way to calculate energy use in a building – difficult at the design stage; almost impossible once the building’s up and running. Ted King of the ODPM outlined proposed energy rating systems. For domestic buildings, the government wants to use Standard Assessment Procedure (SAP). “It is proven to be successful in the technical sense, although it does need some better marketing,” said King. This would be used for new-build, with RD-SAP used for existing houses. For commercial buildings, King said that the EU doesn’t acknowledge a single particular energy rating methodology. Two which the UK government is exploring are CEN standards and Energy Plus (a US-based simulation engine). The preference at the moment is for ‘something based on Energy Plus’. The idea will be to produce a set of ‘notional buildings’ so that new buildings can be rated against these. King pointed out that: “Part L2 offers prescriptive, not minimum standards.”

It is clear that many questions are still unanswered by government. For example, it has not yet been decided if energy certificates will be required for a commercial building each time it is sold or let. Whatever standards are finally settled on, they will have to be reviewed every five years under EU legislation. The government is already planning a review of Part L for 2010.

At the conference, representatives of key areas of construction and property (architect, building services engineer, Building Control officer and surveyor) were given the opportunity to comment on how such legislation would affect their sector.

Speaking for architects, Bill Gethring of Fielden Clegg Bradley and chair of the RIBA sustainability group, said: “RIBA supports the aims of the Directive because it produces a level playing field across Europe. It is now vital that architects engage with building performance. Architects balance and co-ordinate a whole building approach. It is our duty to be involved in energy performance.”

Two key challenges for architects will be to move the architectural paradigm towards sustainability; and to convince clients that this is a good thing. “There is no correlation between beauty and sustainability. In fact we should regard a building which performs badly in energy terms as an ugly building – only you can’t see the ugliness.” The other issue is that under the new law, architects would be required to design to a performance standard rather than one which is deemed to reach construction standards. “How does this square with the culture of blame?” asked Gethring. A question that many along the supply chain will also be asking.

Terry Wyatt, head of research for consulting engineers Hoare Lea and past president of CIBSE, sees the new legislation as creating a vital role for building services engineers. “There are very few people who can look at an air conditioning system and say whether it’s the right size, whether it’s properly installed and whether it’s running efficiently.” Services engineers will have to continue their involvement in buildings long after completion, according to Wyatt.

Most importantly, Wyatt says that the new Part L would require architects and engineers to work ever-more closely together. “We have had some bitter arguments with architects over gaining Part L approval. In the past we have basically been able to fudge it. You won’t be able to do this any more.” Both architects and engineers will have to be flexible about their designs.

Building Control officers already have responsibility for ensuring building compliance with legislation. Tracy Aarons of the RICS Building Control Forum, said that one thing they don’t need is to take on the task of ensuring compliance with the new Part L. “The mechanisms currently in place are not sufficient to achieve correct implementation. The levels of expertise of Building Control officers have risen considerably in the past years. The government looks to Building Regulations to control the industry and the BCO is under a lot of burden to deal with these.” Aaron says that the increased levels of training required are beyond the budget of the BCO.

Aaron also pointed out that in the draft document, there is less technical guidance than in current legislation. She commented: “Government is relying on industry institutions to provide the guidance. We need an indication of what will be officially approved.” Overall, from the Building Control point of view, the draft document: “Has too many areas that require further work,” concluded Aaron.

Finally, Roger Watts , chairman of the RICS building surveying faculty, began by saying: “The introduction of this directive is going to be hell for surveyors!”

He added that in 25 years of surveying buildings he had never once been asked about energy efficiency by a client. “Landlords have no interest at all in Part L. But building certification will come as a shock. They will seek to find the lowest common denominator. If contractors do offer to make improvements to buildings to comply with a new Part L, landlords will see it as a money-making scheme!”

Manpower is a major issue for RICS (as well as the other sectors). “There are 500 000 property transactions, sale or let, in the UK every year. We don’t have the people or the know how to deal with building labelling,” said Watts. He also pointed out the impracticalities of energy calculations when a building is part-let, or rented on a floor-by-floor basis.

Alongside building labelling, the new Part L will include the requirement for regular inspection of boilers and air conditioning systems. This also creates a huge challenge for the industry.

Firstly, who does the checking? There are around half a million solid fuel or oil boilers over 20 kW (those which would be affected by the legislation) in commercial sites in the UK. There are barely enough engineers and skilled maintenance teams to deal with the current workload without adding a duty to inspect or offer advice on improvement – both of which would require further training.

Speaking on air conditioning system assessment, Hywel Davies, head of research for CIBSE, said: “The directive requires ‘independent’ inspection by ‘qualified and/or accredited persons’.

Research has shown that this probably means a level of inspector competence at NVQ 3 for site work. There should also be some sort of quality assurance scheme or audit system to ensure the work is carried out correctly. It has been suggested that possibly membership of a body such as the HVCA is required.”

Commenting on the staffing levels required to achieve these assessment checks, managing director of BRE’s Energy Division David Strong, said: “A small army of people will be needed and we don’t know where they are going to come from.”

One of the key problems at the moment is that government seems reluctant to put money into implementing this legislation, expecting industry and its institutions to foot the bill. The construction sector is naturally reluctant to pay for the recruitment, training and research that will be needed to make Part L and the integrated EPBD work.

Attempts to pre-empt the new laws have also been met with government stonewalling. For example, CIBSE has been trying for three years to win a licence from government for its competent persons scheme but to no avail. Many suspect this is because government does not wish to have liability. This has not encouraged others to follow suit.

No one would argue with the aims of the new Part L. The construction industry has no wish to be inherently unsustainable (in any sense of the word). But so far the government has shown little practicality when it comes to making sustainability work on the ground.

The draft document requires some hefty rewriting if the reaction at this conference was anything to go by. The industry has sent this homework back to government very clearly marked ‘Must try harder’…

For more information on the draft Part L and the Energy Performance of Buildings Directive, see the websites www.diag.org.uk or www.epbd.org.uk

The European Directive on Energy Performance of Buildings

Directive 2002/91/EC of the European Parliament and Council, on the energy performance of buildings, came into force on 4th January 2003. It will greatly affect awareness of energy use in buildings and is intended to lead to substantial increases in investments in energy efficiency measures in buildings (domestic and commercial). Legislation must be in place by January 2006 to bring the directive into national law. In the UK, this will be done through a new version of Part L of the Building Regulations (currently in draft form).

This has implications for owners, operators and developers of all buildings in Europe. Building services engineers will have a key role to play in making the Directive work since they are best placed to advise on energy use, sustainability and designing buildings for energy efficiency.

The Directive includes five key methods for driving market transformation to create more energy efficient buildings:

  • A methodology to calculate integrated energy performance of buildings.

  • Minimum energy requirements for new buildings.

  • Minimum energy requirements for existing buildings over 1000 m2 which are undergoing renovation.

  • Energy certification of buildings.

  • Regular mandatory inspection of boilers and air conditioning systems in buildings.

As can be seen from this list, there are many areas of contention – how to organise inspections, how to agree on an energy calculation method, and how to sort all this out before January 2006!

During the Directive Implementation Advisory Group conference on the directive, workshops were held to address particular concerns. One of the most difficult aspects of the new law will be arriving at a workable tool for energy certification. Delegates raised many points on this issue, including:

  • The need for further explanation to ensure that practitioners fully understand the methodology.

  • There must be quality and consistency of data input, especially from existing buildings.

  • The tool used should be able to produce consistent certification of a wide range of building design and system options and should be in the public domain.

  • There is a need to reconcile the desire for a simple tool for simple (and existing) buildings, with the need to be able to handle complex buildings and systems.

Overall, this audience wanted a single core procedure for measuring energy efficiency, which can be inserted into commercial software to certify complex buildings.

The single tool for the certification process would give a level playing field, but would allow users to explore more complex design issues without having to enter data more than once.

  • For more information on the draft Part L and the Energy Performance of Buildings Directive, see the websites www.diag.org.uk or www.epbd.org.uk