Building Regulations across the UK: where are we?

8 FEATURE

www.elmhurstenergy.co.uk

Jason Hewins, New Build Dwellings Manager and Josh Wakeling, Head of Operations

Over the past few years there has been an increased pressure on governments to revise the energy efficiency requirements in Building Regulations as part of the move towards our net zero obligations. This has seen a raft of consultations across all regions of the UK and we wanted to give a brief recap of where all regions currently stand and the expected milestones over the next year.

England

So far, the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) has completed two consultations on changes to Part F and L; the Future Homes Standard and Future Building Standard consultations. These consultations set out the vision for energy efficiency standards in Building Regulations to be introduced in 2025 and also confirmed an interim step will be issued, now known as Part L 2021.

The responses to the Future Homes Standard consultation were published by DLUHC earlier this year. They confirmed that for new homes, Part L 2021 would achieve a 31% reduction in carbon over the current regulations, see a tightening of fabric and service standards, introduce mandatory air tightness testing and more stringent transitional arrangements.

The Future Building Standards consultation proposed changes to energy and ventilation standards for work to existing homes, new and existing non-domestic buildings and mitigation of overheating in new homes.

Although we still await the responses to the Future Building Standards consultation it is the intention of DLUHC to publish the Part L 2021 Approved Documents, SAP 10 and SBEM v6 methodologies in December 2021, with regulations coming into force in June 2022.

Wales

Welsh Government has so far issued three consultations in regards to changes to their Building Regulations. Like England, the Stage 1 consultation set out the intended direction for Part L 2025 and confirmed an interim uplift to Part L, known as Part L 2021. The responses to the Stage 1 consultation show for new homes a 37% reduction in carbon over current regulations will be implemented, as well as a tightening of fabric and service standards, introduction of mandatory air tightness testing and more stringent transitional arrangements.

The Stage 2A consultation, which covered standards for existing domestic buildings and overheating regulations, has been completed and responses published. It was confirmed that

Part L 2021 will see a tightening of fabric standards in work to existing homes, and overheating will be tackled by a new regulation and Part S of the Building Regulations.

A Stage 2B consultation was recently launched covering standards for new non-domestic buildings, closing in January 2022. Two options of uplift over current regulations were proposed; an 18% or 28% reduction in carbon emissions.

The Stage 2B consultation confirmed the intention of Welsh Government to publish the Approved Documents relating to domestic buildings early in 2022, with implementation into regulations in Summer 2022. For non-domestic buildings, Approved Documents are intended to be published in Spring 2022 with implementation into regulations in Autumn 2022.

Scotland

The Scottish Government is currently consulting on changes to energy efficiency standards of the Building Standards known as Section 6. The consultation was due to close on 15th October but has since been extended until 26th November 2021.

The consultation proposed publication of the new standards in ‘early 2022’ with implementation of the standards starting ‘mid 2022’. For new homes it was proposed that either a 32% or 57% reduction in carbon over current standards would be implemented. For new non-domestic buildings either a 16% or 25% uplift over current standards was proposed. Other changes included mandatory air tightness testing and changes to the assessment of overheating risk in new homes. It is expected that a further uplift of the standards would be released in 2024 in line with the New Build Heat Standard.

Northern Ireland

The Department of Finance (DoF) recently launched a consultation on changes to Technical Booklets F1 and F2 with the intention of implementing changes within a short 3-month period from publication of the Booklets in 2022.

For new buildings two options of uplift over current regulations were proposed. Option 1 requires new domestic buildings to achieve an improvement of 25% and new non-domestic buildings a 15% reduction over current regulations. Option 2 requires new domestic buildings to achieve an improvement of 40% (25% for flats) and new non-domestic buildings a 15% reduction over current regulations. as quickly as possible it has been proposed to retain the use of the SAP 2009 and SBEM v4 methodologies.

Following implementation of these changes a further uplift is then planned to utilise the new national calculation methodologies of SAP 10 and SBEM v6.

Conclusion

2022 looks like it could be a very exciting time for the industry with potentially all four regions of the UK implementing new energy efficiency standards into Building Regulations. Elmhurst will keep all members fully updated with developments and we are already planning our training events for all regions to ensure our members are fully prepared prior to the changes come into force.