E-newsletter December 2019
Dear Colleague
Welcome to the December edition of our CIBSE Certification newsletter.
Renewals
For those of you requiring to reinstate your registration please contact CIBSE Certification at epc@cibsecertification.org; we will work with you in completing any compliance requirements needed.
CPD
A quick reminder about keeping your CPD record up to date. We will be conducting our annual CPD audit in the New Year and the easiest way of making sure that this has no impact on you is to ensure that your CPD record for 2019 is up to date and complies with the CIBSE Certification requirements.
Update your CPD record
Differences in the evidence required for DEC audits
DIFFERENCES IN THE EVIDENCE REQUIRED FOR DEC AUDITSIt appears that in some cases assessors are a bit confused on the type of evidence required for a DEC QA Audit. The evidence required can differ depending on whether the DEC required a site survey or whether it was a renewal DEC which didn't require a site visit. In the table below assessors can see an indicative list of evidence required for each situation, please note that for renewal DECs the important requirement is the confirmation that nothing has changed since the last site survey, which means that a verification of the floor area is not required again as it has been done in the past.
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Scotland EPC Assessors
The building Standards Division in Scotland have advised us of the following problem when producing EPCs in Scotland. Please take note of the advice offered and use it where appropriate when you are producing EPCs.
We will expect this advice to have been followed when conducting audits.
“We have been made aware that, within iSBEM a U-value of 2.4 W/m2K is assigned to Scottish uninsulated cavity wall constructions identified as being dated pre-1975 through the NCM construction and glazing databases and also, likely through 3rd party software providers of the NCM.
This U-value of 2.4 W/m2K is not representative of a standard uninsulated cavity wall which one would expect to have a U-value of around 1.6 - 1.7 W/m2K.
We’ll investigate how best to rationalise this in the context of BRE’s current review of database information and amend at the next review point. However, prior to the databases being revised we would suggest that assessors assign an alternative wall construction from the NCM construction and glazing database that is more representative of the thermal performance of this type of wall construction.
Below are two examples with the same outcome which we would suggest as an acceptable approach in the interim, when selecting a construction from the iSBEM library and for the inference procedure.
SBEM library
Category – select ‘Cavity wall (clear)’
Library – select ‘Clear cavity wall (E&W) pre-1974’
This assigns a U-value of 1.6 and Km 172 kJ/m2K
Assessors should record the rationale for assigning this wall type in their case notes.
Inference procedure
Sector – select the relevant sector (this has no influence on the returned U-value).
Building Reg Comp – select ‘no date uninsulated’
General description – select ‘Cavity wall, brick/blocks’
This assigns as U-values of 1.6 and Km 172 kJ/m2K
Assessors should record the rationale for assigning this wall type in their case notes”.
Are UK businesses ready for ESOS?
Head of CIBSE Certification, Andrew Geens, was interviewed by Mel Blackmore from Blackmores on the delivery of ESOS Phase 2 reports.
The interview covers issues around meeting the 2019 deadline as well as some of the benefits of using ISO 50001 in the longer term. This may be of interest to anyone involved in ESOS reporting or ISO 50001 implementation.
Listen to the full podcast
Christmas Closure
The CIBSE Certification office will be closed from 17:00 on Tuesday 24 December and will re-open on Thursday 2 January 2020.
During this period, when we will be unable to take telephone calls we will be periodically monitoring emails, so if you have any technical or lodgement queries, or need to provide new insurance details please email epc@cibsecertification.org. Please bear in mind that response times may be longer than usual.
Lodgement credits can be purchased online at all times but are allocated to the individual account only. Bulk purchases (for company accounts) for lodgements that you may want to make during the closure period will need to be made before 12:00 on 24 December 2019.
Kind regards,
Professor Andrew Geens
BEng (Hons) PhD CEng FCIBSE
Head of CIBSE Certification Ltd.