oh joy.

So, we're all going to have to get trained up in Sap 2009 in order to do the assessments needed for PV installations to get the higher FIT rate, then a couple of months later we'll have to retrain in Sap 2012.

no doubt, and I'm not disputing that SAP 2009 might need reforming, just having a little cry about the timing.

it's an option Daryl, problem is I'd only want to work with one who actually knows what they're doing, and can work with us to find the best way to achieve the required SAP rating rather than the idiots who must conduct most of the energy certificates used by estate agents etc.

If you know anyone of that ilk in the Leeds area...

Thing is though we'd really be needing to make an initial assessment before we could issue a quote, on top of an actual certificate to send off with the MCS certificate after completion of the PV installation to prove the house meets the requirements (whatever they may be).

I commented as follows, this will be one of my longer posts!


General comments -- the document and procedure is unnecessarily long and too long winded especially when the results are then simplified to give the A > G rating. The consequence of this is that huge amounts of tweaking of results will inevitably take place just below the band boundaries. Having worked out a score on a scale of 1 to 100 why ever not use this score?

Summary. -- SAP should be about energy ONLY, costs change, fuel demography changes, CO2 is and should be completely irrelevant, there is barely a definition of what zero CO2 means and it change too.
--
Introduction. – a bullet point for air leakage losses could well be included separately in the first list, these will become increasing important as fabric losses hopefully decrease.

Thermal mass has no bearing on heat losses or energy use, it does have an influence on comfort when there is too little of it in a poorly constructed house and a twice on heating regime. The heat should be stored in the thermal mass and its thickness is an important factor omitted from the calculations. High thermal mass homes are more comfortable to live in than plasterboard tents of low thermal mass.

Pressure Test Results – it is nice to see these getting a mention.

Garages!! Surely heated garages must be penalised!!! They are insane.

Conservatories – It is not relevant whether these are separated from the building. It is relevant whether or not they are heated (or cooled). The huge majority of modern conservatories are being used as heated living spaces. The heat losses from these are truly huge. Ref Green Building Bible Vol 2 p82ff.
To allow a conservatory be calculated as if it were not present is very unrealistic.

Thermal Bridging – It is nice to see this problem being addressed. Some big areas that have not been mentioned are: gable walls, typically forming a huge thermal bridge into an unheated loft space. Ditto with party gable walls. Foundations and underground walls are also thermal bridges, often very big ones, internal wall substructure is also a thermal bridge more so with suspended ground floors no mention of most of these.
Room in roof – in general the floor of a room in the roof is cooled by outside air being allowed to blowing in-between the floor joists also cooling the ceiling below. I the real world this is a massive problem and should be taken into account in SAP calculations.
Internal Temperatures – It would seem to me most strange to have a system like SAP in place that attempts to allow comparison between buildings and then to allow different temperatures, the lower the internal temperatures inputted the lower the apparent energy use and the better the SAP result will look. There must be a very strong case for using a pre-determined temperature profile for all homes to allow the SAP results to represent something that is useful for comparison purposes. Even for building regulation approval surely this would HAVE TO BE the case?

Space heating requirement – see above it is almost pointless having all this accuracy when internal temperatures can be tinkered with -- see above “Internal Temperatures”
Heating controls – Only those that control time and temperature should be allowable. This is the C21 and Chronostats should be norm. SAP would be a good way to assist the process of changing from thermostats which only allow one set temperature to chronostats that allow different temperatures at different time. There could be a great benefit easily obtainable from giving higher SAP scores to buildings that can automatically control both time and temperature accurately (chronostatic control) rather than on/off control at one set temperature.

Electricity Tariff – This makes no difference to the total energy used in a building and as such should not be taken into account in SAP calculations, it can change too and changing supplier can reduce the cost more than changing tariff in some cases -- why?

Smoke control areas -- nice to see the mention, would a SAP value be withdrawn in the case of illegal fuel being used? This is happening a lot at present.

CO2 and Primary Energy. – The total; energy used by a building is the only thing that is going to matter in the future we seem to be obsessed with CO2 calculations and these are not only controversial but nonsensical, energy is the important thing.