Trade
Homeowner
The Domestic Industry - At the crossroads and into a step change with renewables
, 13.06.2011
The multi-billion pound domestic heating industry is right in the middle of a step change – and the change to renewable and microgeneration is offering new opportunities at all levels. It is reasonably described as being the next generation of domestic heating products, services and installation techniques. At the heart of it is the pressing need for greater and more detailed energy conservation and more efficient consumption. This new dawn offers – installers, especially - a massive opportunity to prosper in the face of the downturn. But with the change comes a need for new knowledge and approaches to customers.
The domestic market is now fully embracing renewable and the Government’s Renewable Heat Incentive (RHI) also known as ‘clean energy cash-back’ and its Green Deal, which come into force next year, is helping drive and promote the marketplace. The RHI scheme will reward end users for using renewables to heat their homes and to provide domestic hot water requirements while the Green Deal enables bill payers to get energy efficiency improvements without having to front up the cash.
The RHI scheme will support a range of technologies, including air and ground-source heat pumps (and other geothermal energy), solar thermal and renewable combined heat and power. Solar and heat pump technology – and Hybrid-type systems – will become serious mainstream product sectors.
According to Chris Huhne, Secretary of State of Energy and Climate Change: “Millions of homes and businesses could benefit from improvements under the Green Deal. Owner-occupiers and tenants will both be able to reap the rewards of better energy efficiency. And there will be extra help for those most in need, such as the vulnerable, those on low incomes and those with homes that are expensive to treat.”
He goes on to say that the Green Deal also represents a significant opportunity for businesses……“trades people, energy companies and investors will have access to a huge and growing market, with implications for jobs and skills across the supply chain – and across the country, with no regional bias. We predict that the supply chain could support 100,000 jobs within five years, spread across the UK”.
With the Green Deal, businesses will provide the capital, getting their money back via the energy bill. At the heart of the offer is a simple rule: estimated savings on bills will always equal or exceed the cost of the work.
David Orr, Chief Executive of the National Housing Federation, says: “Housing associations are excited by the Green Deal's potential to help green the nation's homes and reduce fuel bills. The National Housing Federation is working closely with DECC to ensure housing associations are at the forefront of delivering the Green Deal, not just for their affordable 2.5 million homes, but across the entire housing stock.”
All of which is extremely good news for installers – but only if they get up to speed with renewables because for householders to qualify for RHI cashback, both the product and the installer must be Microgeneration Certification Scheme (MCS) approved.
The Microgeneration Certification Scheme (MCS) is an independent scheme, supported by the Department of Energy and Climate Change, for the certification of microgeneration products and installers.
MCS provides reassurance to consumers through the assessment of microgeneration products and installers against robust quality, performance and safety criteria. The accreditation scheme is supported by industry certification bodies and non-governmental groups as a prime method for making a substantial contribution to cutting the UK's dependency on fossil fuels and carbon dioxide emissions.
BPEC, for example, launched its Heat Pump Installer (HPI) assessment designed to sit within the MCS framework early last year. This training is key for installers to understand best applications and sizing for heat pumps and they should be racing to sign up for it.
It is also important that they only purchase quality renewables product from already established and well known brands that have the service and technical back up to support installers and that can turn around parts on a same day/next day basis. If a householder has no hot water they won’t be happy to hear they have to wait a week or two for an engineer’s visit or a spare part!
These established companies are also more likely to be in a position to help with MCS training for heat pump and solar thermal, guiding installers through the process and giving all the information and documentation needed for the quality management assessment.
Installers who have had the foresight to train for MCS certification are already cashing in on the renewables windfall created by RHI as eligibility for the scheme has been backdated to installations from July 2009. A ‘Premium’ payment will be available for installations from July this year for up to 25,000 installations. The Premium payment will help people cover the purchase price of green heating systems. Those taking up the Premium will then be eligible for a RHI tariff from October next year.
As simple monobloc heat pumps appear that have sealed refrigerant circuits and need no refrigerant handling qualifications, these will appear increasingly inviting to the traditional gas boiler installer/plumber.
Heat pump technology will become common in domestic heating systems and in many cases the traditional, high efficiency boiler will be fitted as well - to offer flexibility, perhaps as part of a hybrid system. In time heat pumps will become the primary source of domestic heating and hot water.
However, the Energy Saving Trust, in its publication ‘Getting warmer: a field trial of heat pumps’ conducted over 83 sites, saw a variety of early installations “many of which had failed to apply the heat pump correctly”. The report goes on to say: “Responsibility for the installation should be with one company, and ideally be contractually guaranteed to ensure consistency in after-sales service… Often there was no single contractor responsible for the installation, which might involve a ground works contractor, a plumber, a heat pump installer and an electrician. This meant that there was often no single point of responsibility or any liability for the eventual performance of the whole installation.” This illustrates the need for fully qualified and knowledgeable installers to step up and fill the void!
While traditional modern boiler technology still has its part to play in achieving energy efficiency and cutting running costs, renewables are here to stay and the demand for them will only become greater. It is essential that installers realise we are in a transition period between old and new and take this message on board: they must make themselves as knowledgeable about solar, heat pumps and hybrid systems as they are about traditional boilers now.
Whether in the private or social housing arena, installers have a lot to gain from these government initiatives and need to be getting themselves trained for MCS accreditation now.