Hello, welcome and thanks for listening to Carbon Climates, an energy podcast dedicated
to discussing all things energy, carbon and sustainability while pointing out what's
getting hot, aside from our planet. I'm your host Aine and today I'm joined with my Carbon
Climate and co-host Louise. Yeah, that's you introduced. But yeah, thanks for coming on
Louise. My pleasure, my pleasure. Of course, this is the first Carbon Climates episode.
It's an honour. Yeah, I'm glad. I'm glad. Like, yeah, you were definitely the first choice in
mind of mine. Yeah. So before we get into today's topic, how's your week been and how
have you been carving and can you tell us a bit about yourself? How has my week been?
Do we love each other? Do you want the podcast answer or the real answer? Yeah, do you want the podcast answer or the real answer?
Yeah. Living the dream, Enya. Living the sustainability dream. Of course. First,
well, that brings on your job title. Like, what is it? It is a sustainability engineer.
Wow. Very impressive stuff. Same as you. How long have you been in the sector as a sustainability engineer?
Well, four years full time and then I did my placement year in the sector. So we'll count that.
Oh, very good. That was you did a placement from Coran. It was Geography. Yeah. Geography. Very good.
That's like, did you hear about this through University of Ulster or? No. So one of the directors of the company,
my mum worked with his wife. It actually was aimed at my brother because he was doing like a
natural engineering at the time. So she had said to mum for him. And then I just asked if they had it
because they had like, whenever I went on to look at the website, they had environmental stuff.
And at the time I was wanting to go down like environmental management route. So I just applied
and asked. Then I originally came in to do Braille but ended up doing all the simulation stuff.
Like wow, that's amazing. Okay. I can imagine, imagine if you and your brother are beaten for the same roles.
This is such. I feel like they'd make a K drama about that. I would watch it.
You've seen what I watched. That's good. Well, so you're saying at uni you've seen yourself in the
environmental management sector. See when you were at secondary school, did you ever see yourself in
this sector? Do you know what? I was actually thinking about this because I used to go in
hall the other time as kids. They were like five years old. That was the first time I ever
seen a winter van. And I was fascinated. My mum has photos of me and my older brother standing
at the access patch of a winter van. I'll smile at my cheeks. We were focused like 2001 or something
in the environment. Didn't even know what a winter van was. So me and my mum were probably fascinated
by these things. I think from the end I did sort of think that's quite interesting. Because I was
kind of being interested in like renewables and stuff. But then the geography went down
environmental management route. So yeah, I always kind of did see myself working in like
renewables and energy efficiency and stuff from that. That's really great to hear.
Did you get work experience at school? Like say in sixth form or fifth form? Yeah.
Yeah. Where did you get yours? I went to primary school. Of course. My primary school.
And all the teachers, I can actually remember half the teachers, but they were like,
they remembered me. I said, I don't remember you teaching me at all. That's so sweet.
You know where I did my work experience? Oh that? Oh that's it? Yeah. And now look at us now.
Wow. Wow. Really pumped. And like that's the thing. I feel like at secondary school,
I don't know if you find it, I feel like teachers, they put on a lot of pressure
on you to maybe as, oh you have to go do a degree at a particular uni and you have to look at these
jobs, like push you towards certain jobs. Which were like maybe science, medical, law based. But
they didn't even like, you know, put a thought up to like the likes of film. Or even like apprenticeships
or anything like that. It's very much just go to uni. And because now I'm like, I've come to the
realisation and it's simply because I think it's more well known now. But there was the option for
us to maybe do a part time degree and then also have a job when we're like 19, 20. So rather than
doing the full like three or four years uni, which you know, fair enough, it is a uni, like it's an
experience in itself. We could have like, you know, from 19 got experience and like also like
be getting a degree. So earning, earning and learning, learning, learning, learning. I like that.
But like, yeah, that definitely wasn't publicised. I think that's only really good if you know
exactly what you want to do. Yeah, no, you're right. You're right. Like if you were like,
I didn't really know what I wanted to do, you know, if I wanted to do geography. Like if I knew,
if I knew, you know, at 19, 18, 19, you know, it probably would have been a different choice.
Like if you knew point blank, this is what I want to do. Because you see a lot of even in our company,
yeah, a lot of younger people coming in ex-girl levers because this is what they want to do.
That's like, you know, it's just like, got so, so jealous of you. Yeah.
Knowing how you really made the right decision. Yeah, knowing what direction your life is going.
I stood alone. Well, thanks for that Louise. And now, so we're going to move on to today's topic.
Before we do, I've got one question for you. What did the pirate find most important about
the insulation? I don't know. The R value? For those of you who don't know what an R value is,
that will be explained in the long way. That's a nice segue. That would be a cool segue. R values.
Today's topic is actually called, is actually focusing on EPCs with this episode's title being
EPCs, energy performance is assert. Okay. That was the first thing I came up with when I think like
it was maybe this time last year, shouldn't titles back at you. It was like energy performance is
assert. I'm like, this is it. Okay. Okay. Enough fun. Okay. So myself and Louise are sustainability
engineers and we mainly deal with issuing EPCs to clients for the final constructions of their
buildings. EPC stands for energy performance certificate. For those of you who don't know,
I feel like most people know. Yeah. However, I always like want to explain because even my friend,
he was buying a house, I think a couple of months ago and I looked up his EPC to show,
I was like, oh, what's your EPC? And he was like, oh, what's this? This is mine? So I'm like,
oh, maybe some people don't know that this is right there. So EPC stands for energy performance
certificate. It's a calculation which rates your building from A to G and gives a representation
of how energy efficient it actually is. Even though the energy performance certificate is
only a couple of pages, there's a lot that goes into the calculation itself. Us, me and Louise
are both energy assessors, both LCEAs, which stands for, I'm sorry, I'm just like, I'm just
explaining all the abbreviations. If you ever get into the energy sector, you'll realize there are
a lot of abbreviations. Some might say too many. But LCEA stands for low carbon energy assessor.
So for this, that means we look at the area of the building, the type of construction it's made up
of. When we talk about constructions, we're talking about what materials make up the wall,
how much insulation goes into it, how permeable the building is. When we talk about permeability
in terms of building, we talk about the amount of the airflow for it, like the infiltration.
We also look at the heating, ventilation and hot water type of the building and also what the lights
are. These are all put into a software calculator and this calculator spits out a carbon amount,
which is then rated on an orthonumeric scale. From A to G.
Keep it simple, yeah.
Yeah. Like, okay, I won't be trying that again. Okay. So why is this important? Because all the
buildings require a valid EPC in order to be sold or rented out. So Louise, in your opinion,
how valuable do you think people actually look at the EPCs? How important are they to the function
of the building?
I guess it's just theoretical.
Theoretical, okay.
It's not really a good indication of how energy efficient the building is, I think.
That's honestly...
This is the inside scoop, directly from the energy.
Directly, straight from the source.
Because if you think about things like, you can maybe not pass your building regulations,
but still get an EPC that A.
Yeah.
I think that's like...
Yeah.
Would you be in the agreement that maybe an EPC reform is needed? Like, you know, different
layer of the structures, like investigation into what is actually important.
Yeah, maybe. I mean, I think it is good because it's obviously comparing your building to
other buildings. It's not like what it is, but it's like what it can be.
Mm-hmm.
That's pretty cool now.
Very, very interesting. Well, you also do operational energy reports, which are reports
that are required for an energy accreditation, like for the building.
An operation, they pretty much give the real life operation of the building.
So what it's actually producing in terms of electricity, fuel, what's being used, flow rates,
et cetera. I always do lists, like, you know, sort of.
Yeah.
And I'm trying to stop it.
Yeah.
Sorry, guys.
It's like a natural loop.
A loop. Exactly. Yeah. She does it in real life as well.
It's the prettiest thing.
But like, sorry.
Please, can you get your little fever test or something?
Well, so also, like, do you also perform operational reports or put together operational
reports for clients as well? And when you started doing that, did you see a clear difference between
the likes of what's been out in an EPC and then what actually is going on in the operational report?
Yeah.
Okay.
Yeah. I mean, it's not all that. I'm one is, you know, the operational energy is better than
than the EPC. But there is always a difference. Of course, there's always a difference because
it's actually taking into consideration how a person is supposedly actually, you know,
operating within the building and living within the building.
Yeah.
Like, if you think about it, an EPC doesn't really take into consideration your equipment gains.
Yeah.
Plugin modes. They're massive in every building and operational energy does think about that sort of stuff.
That's pretty interesting. Pretty interesting. So, yeah, that's great.
And often, well, at the minute when we're dealing with different projects, we often get a document,
a contract document that states a specific EPC might be required for the building.
And this is purely a marketing technique so people can advertise. Yep, my building gets an A or a B
or, you know, very snazzy. But yeah, like, has it been annoying seeing that? And then maybe,
like, you're on the project and it's always like, oh no, we want to go,
like, a route that maybe isn't going to achieve that EPC or...
Oh yeah, of course. Especially with the change in building regs.
Oh yeah, change in building regs.
You know, maybe something that, like, something that allowed you to get a certain rating once
is not going to let you get it now. Vice versa.
Yeah.
Jordan is annoying in the way, I think, with the EPC stuff.
Oh, off topic. Completely unlike me.
Do you know whenever you look at houses, you know, like, any sort of domestic assessor,
when you look at domestic APCs, which is not just domestic.
Do you know, like, well, obviously older houses haven't...
Are you going to talk about this? Shall I just stop?
Like, what is it? I think I might bring it up in a later section. No, no, no, no,
but like, keep on going, this is good. There's a lot of things that noise me
every time I say it. Okay.
Well, we talked previously about the training we've done, how we're both LCEAs.
However, like, I myself have only been an LCEA for the past year,
whereas we've been doing APCs for the past, I'd say, five, six years. How old are we?
In your opinion, like, what sort of training pathway did you prefer, or would you find,
do you think would be viable to future energy assessors?
Like, do you think a more hands on approach to the job?
Like, oh, yeah, learning on the job. Yeah.
Learning on the job. Yeah.
I always think, I always think it's like learning to drive,
going to the university and stuff. You're not learning, like, yeah, you're learning the basics,
you're learning how things work. You're getting a baseline knowledge of something,
but you don't actually learn to do something until you're doing it every day.
Yeah. Like, you're going to go into
university and learning the theory behind things. Of course, that's always beneficial,
but, you know, unless you're actually sitting down and putting that into practice,
I don't think that information is retained or it's, you know.
Yeah, no, I completely agree. I can't, I think I've, what is it, no,
I've forgotten more than I've learned. Yeah, yeah, 100%.
But yeah, well, like, what particular guides do you find are helpful in your job?
Guides? Guides, like, you know,
the way we would use SIPSE guides or what one do you use the most?
I use guide A. Guide A.
Wow. Don't ask me what that is.
Guide A. The TM-59 for overheating.
Yes. And occasionally TM-54 for
operational energy. Right, yes.
Like, TM-59, I was going to do a separate episode on itself.
So I'm going to be a suspect for that. Daytune guide.
Yes, daytuned. To come later.
Splinter. That's hot.
Okay, well, that's great. I'm trying to think what my favourite guide is.
I use, I use, like, as you mentioned, I'm a domestic energy assessor or
like domestic on construction, whatever the abbreviation.
Again, another abbreviation. Okay.
You should do a listener game.
Yeah, it's this abbreviation.
Every time there's an abbreviation, it's like, get a point.
I think I do like that manual because it's so bulky and it's about, I think,
now I don't want to say 600 pages, but it's 200 pages between 200 and 600.
Hmm. It's a good document.
Range. Tell us in the comments.
What's your favourite building regulations guide?
If you had one to read for the rest of your life.
Oh, BMI.
Well, as previously mentioned for energy assessors, like us as energy assessors,
we not only issue EPCs, but also building regulations, calculations.
These calculations are often associated with the energy
and can be spit out from the same software that we simulate EPCs from.
So this is, and this is often the thing that clients maybe don't get that part F or part L
building regulation, like, you know, built in simulation regulation document.
It's going to be different from an EPC. Like they're like, oh, it's even though it's
the same model, same software, it's two different things.
It's two different, it's being measured against two different
baselines, not baselines, two different methodologies.
There we, yeah.
Your face there, just so sad methodologies.
It's the national calculator method.
So summary, we submit an EPC and we often submit like a brugel or sap calculation with it.
So, which is the part L bit.
What would be your favourite between the two, doing an EPC or doing a brugel or sap calculation?
What?
Um, there's probably the part L in the brugel because it, like, like I said earlier,
you can pass your EPC, but not pass your building regs.
There's more challenge in the building regs.
I like a challenge.
And you like a challenge, okay.
Um, yeah, like that's interesting.
And also you find like with an EPC, yeah, yeah.
With an EPC, because when we submit it, we launched it, we get QA'd
and you often find that like I'm always really strict with what I can like put in
or I always feel like, you know, oh no, I have to put in this default value or this value.
Whereas a brugel, I feel like you can like, you know, I'm going to see what it's like with,
yeah, with these types of lights or these, this type of heating.
Yeah.
The world, the world you're always strict with.
The world you're always strict with.
But yeah, uh, yeah, okay.
Well, now we're going to come into a section that I think this might be the section you were talking about earlier
about Northern Ireland EPC and domestic regulations.
So since 2012, Northern Ireland has operated under the same energy assessment methodology,
which is equivalent to an English building regulations from 2009 for part L.
Which is ridiculous.
What is it?
Which is ridiculous.
Right, which, oh yes.
So I've prepared a wee short table, which kind of like it talks about all the changes that happened.
And just a summary, pretty much when building regulations were changing in England, Wales and Scotland,
they were staying the same for Northern Ireland.
I'm going to give you the dates onto which they changed.
And I want you to guess what the coinciding event was that maybe stopped the change.
Okay.
So in 2009, England got the 2009 software for domestic energy assessment.
Northern Ireland got the 2009 software for domestic energy assessment.
So 2009, we're both feeling fine.
2009, good job.
2012, England updated to SAP 2012 software.
England, Wales and Scotland, I believe, sorry.
Northern Ireland was told to stay on the SAP 2009 software.
Okay.
Why?
I actually couldn't find a coinciding event with that, so we'll skip that.
2016.
Good as a year.
So the software is still SAP 2012.
However, updates have been provided to the building regulations.
Northern Ireland is still on SAP 2009.
Can you guess what the coinciding event was in 2016 that maybe stopped it from being updated in Northern Ireland?
2016, was it that we didn't have a government?
Well, that is part of it.
But in 2016, Brexit was announced.
I was going between the two because they were both going at the same time.
Yeah.
And so Brexit wasn't announced.
And then I think it was maybe a couple months after that, our elections happened and then we didn't have a government.
So yeah, that was great.
And we still do.
Yeah.
We had to forbid and then they left.
They said this was nice, but they're like, I'm away.
I'm enjoying my holiday.
2020 is when the next update came.
So England was still under the SAP 2012 software for domestic energy assessments.
However, SAP 10 software was introduced, which is a snazzy new software that took into account updated fuel, carbon written for fuels.
OK.
Can you guess what software Northern Ireland was told to stay under?
2009, baby.
As you said earlier, there was no government.
Oh, not failed?
Yeah.
There's a theme.
Yeah, there's a theme.
OK.
Guess what's going to happen next?
2021.
What?
Techno booklet F1 and part L221 announced it's set an implementation date for like an implementation date was set.
So all new domestic energy assessments after a certain date in 2021 or 2022 were told to move to the SAP 10 software.
OK.
Even though the regulations were changed to Northern Ireland, what software did we have to stay under?
2009.
OK.
Can you guess the coinciding event about like why that had to happen?
So the COVID one?
Well, and actually COVID as well.
OK.
And Brexit.
And?
All of them came together.
It doesn't matter.
And I would just also like to stress the like, you know, previous.
It's not a political.
It's not a political like podcast.
Like these are purely my this is purely my opinion.
Like, but we do have a unique geopolitical setting and it does severely impact the updates that received onto local bills and regulations.
But yeah, so that's just like my research, what I found, you know.
2009.
Yeah, 2009.
It pretty much it has up like what is it?
What it means that like even the software stays the same, the outputs are stayed the same.
And we still just have to pass like, you know, the the BR the and they're just saying, oh yeah, as long as that shows a 20 percent reduction.
So you have to say, oh, yeah, look, I had in this like, you know, she was a 20 percent reduction.
So the software could put a calculation that says pass, but you could feel.
15 percent for no domestics are 25 percent for flats reduction and then 40 percent for houses.
And yes, it's just it's it's really confusing.
Whereas, like, you know, the non domestic software, the one we use, it's flagged up right away.
Like, you know, if you even though the BR was lower than the TR, if it didn't get more than 15 percent reduction, that was a fail.
That's only recently, though, because whenever the first the rigs are fresh announced, you have to just do it manually.
It's so absurd.
They don't make it easy for us.
They don't.
For the building sector.
OK, well, that's great. Thank you for playing that sector.
I'm not going to move on to another group.
I mentioned the title of this, energy performance is a cert.
I think I'll call this always be certain.
Certain.
OK, I'm just going to ask you a couple of questions and I want your best guess.
So we talked about how we perform part out calculations, building regulations, calculations on particular non domestic software.
How many non domestic software's do you think are right there?
So non domestic, non domestic, like different brands.
Close.
Do you have the answer?
Yeah.
18.
I will publish a link to a list of those softwares, but yeah, there is a lot of them.
There's a lot more than three.
There's only three that I know of.
But yeah.
So in 2020, the Energy Assessment Guidance for London came out and it showed that a certain carbon factor for a certain fuel had decreased over time,
making it really like a lot better, a lot healthier.
I feel like I'm doing my part out of ExxonMu.
But can you tell me that fuel?
It decreased.
Doesn't it got better?
It got better, yeah.
Electric?
Yes, exactly.
So over the period, the monitoring period from 2010 to 2020 or 18, whenever it came out,
they found that electricity had just dropped in the amount of carbon it was producing per kilowatt hour.
This is because of all the renewable elements that are connected into the grid, making electricity a cleaner fuel.
So yeah, that was that was grand.
So I've asked the question about non domestic software.
So as I explained, SAP 10, the new SAP 10 methodology, softwares have come out for that.
Can you guess how many domestic bodies cover that software?
I'm going to just say three again.
Close, four.
I meant non domestic, domestic the first time.
I'll bring out of that, OK?
Well, I want to move on to a section now.
It's called Watch Your Energy Performance.
So this is a section where I just want to highlight how it is possible to find out what your EPC rating is.
Watch Your Energy Performance is if you go to the.gov.uk website and go find an energy certificate,
look up your postcode, find your address and then there's your EPC rating and you can show it off to your friends.
Like, you know, some notes.
But yeah, I'm currently ranting at the minute, so my energy performance, I'm not going to have too much to be with,
but I think I'm sitting on a E or D.
It's pretty, it's not how I'd like it to be.
But did you look up yours at all?
Well, I still live with my mum and dad.
Like, it's, you know, in this, in this, you can have a crazy question.
Of course I do.
I get my dinner made for me, I get my water made for me.
Can I go?
Yeah, we can just go, you can leave me.
Go.
We don't actually have any EPC.
And you know why that is?
Because it was pre 2001.
Exactly.
Yeah, EPCs then became a legal requirement, I think, for UK in 2005.
They did them later for Northern Ireland.
There's only a document that I think 2014 that comes out being like, if you buy or sell property, you need to have an EPC.
I think we moved, I think we would have bought the house in 2001.
I did actually look it up, but we don't have one.
And here, if you're standing there, you don't need one.
You don't need one?
You don't need one.
So yeah, be very, be very interested to, like, you know, I can remind you.
What's this while we're talking?
But I would also like to point out, Alex, so I'm an on construction domestic energy assessor.
And this is the thing, there are many different types of energy assessors.
There is, well, pretty much on construction domestic energy assessor, and then domestic energy assessor.
So domestic energy assessors, they can assess the building if it's been, if it's an existing.
So they are qualified to assume, like, you know, lots of defaults.
Whereas on construction, I pretty much, the contractor tells me what to do.
Like, you know, it's like, this is how you build the building, and like, brilliant.
You've got all your certificates there. Love it.
Whereas non-domestic, that's not the case.
You can be qualified as non-domestic and do existing and new builds as well.
Like, okay, well, Louise, you've been great to have all.
Thank you very much for coming on.
Do you have any advice for future prospective energy assessors looking to get into this sector?
It's kind of a niche sector to get into.
Yeah.
Like, we think about the, like, the place missions and stuff they get in.
They typically come from energy degrees.
Yeah.
Which, you know, they might not push this end of work.
Yeah.
Um, so it's probably hard for, like, if I didn't do my placement here,
I wouldn't have known that this was even a thing.
Exactly. Yeah.
Yeah, I don't know. Just get out there.
Like, put in your CV.
I think a lot of people, a lot of companies are like, like to help young, like.
My main advice to graduates is to not be afraid to say you don't understand things.
It's laughable.
It's like I go on about this all the time.
It annoys me.
Don't learn if you don't know.
So you have to say you don't know what you're doing to be able to learn.
I am six years in this sector.
I still don't know.
Oh, actually.
We're just, we're just living, living a little prayer.
We're just 20, 27 and 20, I'm taught by seven, 26.
26 and 28 year old teenagers.
Teenagers.
Uh, but you know, okay, that's good.
Well, like yours is actually quite insightful and like, you know, it's like quite encouraging
to people.
Mine was always be certain when they show you inserts.
Hmm.
Yeah. Nice way to round it off.
Nice way to round it off.
I want to clarify that as well.
When you get into the sector, you're an EPC, every EPC you lodge up into the system, it
gets QA'd or it can get like queried by an external body.
So you have to prepare evidence.
So yeah, that, that's why I feel like, you know, I feel like mine's more an inside one.
Like, you know, people on the inside get it.
You've seen, you know, whenever you upload your, you upload your EPCs, you know,
EPC for an thumbs up down the bottom.
If you are unhappy with your EPC, it's contact us, call me, address.
I don't know.
What if you're happy about it?
Yeah. What about if you're just, if you're happy, but
What if you wanted to say job well done?
Here, that, I see that EPC you did.
You just lodged.
Yeah.
Really loved it.
Good job.
Your system efficiency, like, you know, wow.
How did you do that?
Can you show me?
This is the, like, I feel like
This is the delirium.
Yeah.
But yeah, that is all I have for you.
But wait, so again, thanks for coming on and you've been really interesting to talk to
and you will most certainly be back.
Yeah, can't wait to come back.
Bye.
But yeah, thanks for listening to Carbon Climates.
If you follow us on Instagram at carbon underscore climates,
you can keep up to date with all our latest episode and any news or information and posts
we might share.
Okay, but thanks for listening.
Bye.