Building Energy Ratings [BER]

Low Income Housing Programme - Around 60,000 Irish households are estimated to live in persistent fuel poverty and a further 160,000 or so experience intermittent fuel poverty.  Fuel poverty has been defined as the inability to heat ones home to an adequate (i.e. safe and comfortable) level owing to low household income and poor, energy inefficient housing and also the need to spend greater than 10% of household income on fuel to achieve an acceptable level of comfort and amenity.

In general, low income householders are unable to afford the capital investment measures that would improve the energy quality of their homes. 

 SEI’s Low Income Housing Programme was set up to help establish and implement a national plan of action to systematically address the problem of fuel poverty . SEI has published a Low Income Housing programme strategy.

Grants will be provided to homeowners who invest in energy efficieny improvements in the following areas -

Installation of high efficiency gas or oil fired boilers with heating controls upgrade

Home Energy Saving (HES) scheme provides grants to homeowners who are interested in improving the energy efficiency of their home.
The scheme is open to all owners of existing houses built before 2006. Sustainable Energy Ireland administers the scheme.
Assistance will be provided by way of fixed grants towards the costs of implementing upgrade measures. The types of measures currently eligible under this scheme are roof insulation, wall insulation, high efficiency boilers and heating control upgrades.

The European Communities (Energy Performance of Buildings) Regulations 2006 (S.I. No. 666 of 2006), provide that certain actions in respect of BERs are offences punishable by fines and imprisonment.  A full list of offences can be found in the regulations .  For example, the following offences are punishable by a fine not exceeding €5,000;

Failure by the owner of a building or the agent of such owner to produce and allow inspection by a building control authority or an authorised officer thereof of within 28 days a printed copy of a BER certificate required in respect of that building by the regulations”;
Making a statement for the performance of his or her functions to a BER assessor, to SEI or to an authorised officer that he or she knows to be false or misleading in a material particular or recklessly making a statement that is false or misleading in a material particular;
Failing to disclose a material particular to a BER assessor, to SEI or to an authorised officer for the performance of their functions”

The Non Domestic Energy Assessment Procedure (NEAP) is the methodology for demonstrating compliance with specific aspects of Part L of the Building Regulations. NEAP is also used to generate the Building Energy Rating (BER) and advisory report for new and existing non domestic buildings.

NEAP calculates the energy consumption and CO2 emissions associated with a standardised use of a building. The energy consumption is expressed in terms of kilowatt hours per square metre floor area per year (kWh/m2/yr) and the CO2 emissions expressed in terms of kilograms of CO2 per square metre floor area per year (kg CO2/m2/yr).

Renewable energy firm Airtricity hopes to attract 500,000 residential electricity and gas customers in the Republic over the next five years.

Airtricity is promising to slash 10pc off the price of an average ESB home bill, which could save consumers an average of €120 a year. Airtricity said it will also match any price reductions introduced by the ESB in response to its re-entry to the market.

The mass switch-over came as it emerged that the savings could be made by switching from the ESB to Bord Gais Energy.

Bord Gais are promising to keep prices at least 10pc below ESB rates for the first year, and 5pc lower for two further years.

Customers who currently spend around €1,000 a year on electricity could expect to save €125, and heavier users spending €1,600 a year could save €209.

Although the domestic electricity market has been open to competition since 2005, this is the first time that a major alternative supplier has targeted the household market.

 A BER makes the energy performance of a home visible to prospective buyers and tenants and enables them to take energy performance into consideration in their next house purchases or rental decision.

Below are  recommendations as to what you can do to improve the energy efficiency of your home.

 Increasing the insulation in the walls/attic/floors
 Installing advanced energy efficient windows/doors
 Measures to achieve controlled, healthy ventilation
 Replace an old or inefficient boiler with a more efficient boiler
 Installing modern heating controls
 Installing certain types of renewable energy heating systems
 Insulating the hot water cylinder and pipe work

This will  will help save you money from the moment you move in.

The cost of a BER assessment is not regulated so prices will vary. Indeed, some newspaper reports have highlighted wide disparities in prices quoted from some assessors and also the length of time taken to do the job.