Building Energy Rating (BER)

From 1990 to 2006 the primary energy consumption in Ireland increased by 32% and reached 3,965 ktoe (2,990 ktoe for final energy) in the residential sector. An “average” dwelling in Ireland consumed 25,304 kWh in 2006. From 2000 to 2008, energy prices increased drastically: electricity by 99%, kerosene (heating fuel) by 78% and natural gas by 87%. Prices for wood pellets increased by 12% from 2006 to 2008.

In order to raise public awareness of the energy performance of buildings, every building owner who puts their building on the market for sale or rent is required to provide the BER to prospective buyers and tenants. With the information provided by the BER, potential buyers or tenants will be able to take the energy performance into consideration before purchasing or renting. The consumer shall be provided with better information. There will be no legal requirement to improve bad energy performance after purchase.

It is a national policy (Irish Building Energy Rating) implementing a supra-national policy (European EPBD)

Relevant sectors

• Services
• Residential
• Industrial

In principle, all kinds of actions to improve building energy efficiency are to be supported by the BER and the advisory report it includes. The BER legislation does not specify whether these should be on the building shell or the building-integrated systems (such as for heating or cooling).
By providing the BER, building occupants shall be encouraged to improve the energy performance of their buildings through retrofitting actions. This would account for stability of value of buildings and would also entitle building owners to demand a higher rental price.
However, retrofitting after the BER is not compulsory.

Relevant target groups

• Manufacturer of prefabricated houses
• Architect
• Engineering consultant
• Real estate agent
• Investor-occupier
• Investor
• User
• Energy consultant

Direct beneficiaries

• User

  End users, certification providers / energy assessors are direct beneficiaries.

Indirect beneficiaries

• Manufacturer

  Industry and manufacturers (provided that the certificates lead to the uptake of energy saving measures) are indirect beneficiaries.

Relevant barriers

• Knowledge and information barriers: Certification is an important policy intervention that can help raise awareness of energy consumption and also address the market failures that cause sub-optimal uptake of energy efficiency measures in buildings. Along with the BER, there are campaigns in print media and on the internet to raise awareness of the subject and make sure people get informed.
• Lack of interest and motivation in energy efficiency-improvement: With the information provided, users and owners will be motivated to invest in the energy improvement of their buildings because they will realise that it is profitable in the long run. Building owners or investors usually focus rather on short term costs than on the long term value of buildings and do not use opportunities to improve energy efficiency, even if it would pay back after a while.

The policy includes the training and accreditation of assessors, as well as a promotion and consultation campaign. Since 2004, SEAI personnel have participated in 210 events with over 24,000 people. They ran an advertising campaign targeting the design and construction industry, the legal profession and the general public (in print and electronic media). Info on www.bigee.net/s/nfptfb (IEA 2010, p. 46).

Another part of the package is the attempt to set efficiency performance standards to the highest level possible. This is important for new buildings because the development in energy efficiency technologies is rapid and the maximum level should be achieved due to the long lifetime of buildings (DCENR 2009, p. 77). In order to be labelled A1, the heating and cooling energy consumption of a dwelling has to be below 25 kWh/m²/yr. In contrast, a G-rated dwelling has an energy consumption of more than 450 kWh/m²/yr (figures from 2008) (BER b).

The policy includes innovative instruments/elements combining them to an innovative package
According to Kevin O’Rourke (Head of Energy Demand Management at SEI) the advisory report is the real benefit of the scheme, because it explains how to improve energy efficiency of the property and the investment actions it will help to guide and stimulate: “While it’s useful for the building owner to know the energy performance rating of the building, we really want to mobilise the market for delivery of energy saving measures. We felt it was important that the requirement for a building owner to purchase a BER wasn’t viewed as simply another administrative cost burden, so we put a lot of effort into designing a system that would deliver the overall objective, which is to reduce carbon emissions from the building sector and reduce energy costs for building owners and tenants” (eceee 2009, p.11).
The advisory reports are attached to the actual rating page giving tailor made information about potential improvements to several building components (e.g. ventilation, chimneys, walls, lightning). Every advice also includes a brief assessment of costs (low, medium, high) and impacts on the environment (low, medium, high) (for an example, see www.bigee.net/s/vqpzii).

The Irish government could make it compulsory for home sellers or landlords to make the BER visible while advertising the building in the newspapers, for example. This would put pressure on sellers and landlords of less efficient buildings to make investments into their buildings, especially, because less energy consuming accommodation is more attractive to buyers or tenants.

The policy package can also be optimised.
The policy package can be optimised by adding complementary measures like financial incentives. Coupling certification with the MEPS or building codes that exist as well in Ireland, and including calculations that show potential energy savings when codes are exceeded can provide builders with incentives to incorporate energy efficiency measures into the design of new buildings or retrofit proposals for existing buildings. “This can lead to embedding energy efficiency in project planning and realise energy savings at the most cost effective times in the building cycle”. Financial incentives could support the measures in some cases (IEA 2010, p. 19).

Agencies or other actors responsible for implementation
Agencies are needed for compliance management (including, e.g. training and certification of providers of certificates) and for information campaigns. In Ireland, the government assigned this role to SEIA.

Funding
The agencies and their activities need funding from the state budget, but no special funding scheme was created for this in Ireland.

Test procedures
The policy aims at both, new and existing buildings. For an improvement of existing buildings, it is necessary to have an analysis of the stock in order to be able to find the right retrofitting measures and to design the rating scheme so as to reflect the spread of energy consumption and provide incentives to improve energy efficiency.

The Directive 2002/91/EC of the European Parliament and the Council of 16 December 2002 on the energy performance of buildings (EPBD) obligated Member States of the European Union to transpose this Directive into national law. In 2003 a working group was established to plan the implementation of the EPBD in Ireland. The implementation of the policy consisted of four stages: Plan, Implement, Monitor and Evaluate. For best practice examples, investigations into the Danish and Dutch systems already in force at the time were made or commissioned by SEAI. These studies were important for scoping and planning the resourcing, as well as the technical and administrative systems necessary for implementation. In Ireland, a very important element was the Action Plan that was worked out by a joint working group (consisting of DEHLG, DECNR and SEAI) established very early in the process (2003). Practicality, clarity, consistency and cost-efficiency were the key principles (IEA 2010, p. 42). Several national calculation methodologies have been developed (IEA 2010, p.44):

• Residential buildings: Dwelling Energy Assessment Procedure (DEAP) generates a building energy rating for new and existing dwellings, demonstrates compliance with specific aspects of energy regulations for new buildings. It calculates annual values of delivered energy consumption, primary energy consumption, CO₂ emissions and costs.
• Simple, non residential buildings: Non-Domestic Energy Assessment Procedure (NEAP), generates a building energy asset rating for new and existing non-domestic buildings, demonstrates compliance with specific aspects of building regulation for new buildings. The Simplified Building Energy Model (SEBM) calculates monthly energy use and CO₂ emissions.
• Complex, non residential buildings: Dynamic Simulation Modelling (DSM), energy asset rating for complex buildings. 
• Large, existing buildings (< 1000m²): ORCalc Software, calculates the operational rating of a building from annual utility consumption.

The assessments are uploaded to the National Administration System (NAS) and if they pass the checks, an approved energy certificate will be published on the National Public Register with all relevant data (IEA 2010, p. 45).In April 2011, there were 2215 BER assessors registered for all dwellings and 437 for all non residential buildings (SEAI 2012). 300 BERs are issued daily for dwellings but only 10 for non residential buildings (eceee 2009, p. 10).According to the EBPD, the Directive should have been transposed and given practical effect by 4 January 2006. Ireland did not have any experience with energy certification and therefore took an option of an additional three-year period to give practical effect to the provisions of building energy ratings, measures to improve efficiency of heating installations and boilers, and inspection of air-conditioning systems (both came into force in January 2008).Finally, the minimum energy performance requirements for new residential buildings came into force in July 2006 and for new non-residential buildings in July 2008. The energy certification for new residential buildings and the feasibility assessment of alternative energy systems came into force in January 2007, for new non-residential buildings in July 2008, for existing buildings offered for sale or rent and the display of certificates in public buildings over 1000m² in January 2009.In 2010, the EU passed recast of the EBPD (Directive 2010/31/EU), so Ireland and the other EU Member States now have to adapt their national EPC legislation to this, following the same steps if required.The policy generally tries to promote energy efficient investment behaviour. A website is maintained which provides a range of informational facts for building owners, potential buyers and tenants (SEAI a). The website specifically contains:

• Information for the building owner and user
• Building energy assessment calculation procedures and software
• Registry of assessments, certificates and advisory reports
• Registry of assessor training providers
• Registry of assessors
• Examination booking
• Quality assurance procedures
• Help desk
• Administration and finance system (IEA 2010, p. 43)

Statistical analysis of energy use and the development of benchmarks for existing buildings and quality control audits of certificates and assessors are possible with this system.The assessors have to have a relevant background in the building industry and have to go through accredited training as well as pass a national examination and sign up to the Code of Practice (SEAI 2011). The training providers themselves, as mentioned above, have to be certified by the NQAI. 

Actors responsible for design
The European Union is responsible for general design and framework, the Member States are expected to implement the design according to their own conception.

Actors responsible for the implementation

• Department of the Environment, Heritage and Local Government (DEHLG); responsible for legal transposition
• Department of Communications, Energy and Natural Resources (DCENR); responsible for energy policy
• Sustainable Energy Authority of Ireland (SEAI); responsible for implementing the building energy-rating certification scheme
• Department of Education and Science (DES) and National Qualifications Authority of Ireland (NQAI); responsible for maintaining the quality of assessor training
• Architects and designers: responsible for designing energy-efficient buildings

Assessors: responsible for calculation and issuance of the BERs

Monitoring
There is a monitoring system in place and this is a model for good practice. Still, in Ireland, experience with monitoring is limited so far because the scheme has only been implemented recently. As at the end of October 2012, more than 330,000 ratings had been published on the NAS, consisting of 321,336 residential buildings and 10,150 non residential buildings (SEAI 2012, p.2).
Buildings that are occupied by public service bodies and exceeding 1,000 m² are obliged to have a Display Energy Certificate (DEC). Until November 2012, 98 DECs have been provided nationwide.
The monitoring records and publishes how many energy ratings are provided to domestic and non-domestic buildings and divides the rated building performances in different categories (see the next tables).

Evaluation
In Ireland no extensive evaluation of the certification scheme has been done so far, but consumer awareness and attitude surveys show a high level of recognition of the concept of energy certification for buildings among the general public.

• Dynamic market transformation and/or innovation: The policy aims at changing the investment behaviour of building occupants. Through the BER the occupants shall be made aware of the opportunity to save money and energy by installing energy efficient appliances and building components in their dwellings.
• Avoiding lost opportunities: In order to avoid lost opportunities, designers in Ireland are supposed to assess buildings at an early stage and use the assessment procedure as a design tool. Trained assessors will provide a building energy rating later.
• Minimising rebound effects: No information is available about whether the BER scheme makes any effort to minimise rebound effects. We estimate this to be unlikely.
• Minimising snap-back effects: As the policy is open-ended, snap back effects will not occur.
• Minimising free-rider effects: With the requirement to present the BER to potential buyers and tenants, and the publication of all BERs, the policy also aims to make those building owners, investors and tenants aware of energy efficiency, who would otherwise not have considered energy efficiency improvements. In this way, free-rider effects are likely to be lower than for an EPC scheme without such requirements to maximise market transparency.
• Creating Spill-over effects: If the BER has an effect that energy-efficient building renovation becomes more common, there could be spill-over effects to owner-occupiers of buildings that are not sold and, hence, will not need a BER. We do not know if this was an intended effect of the Irish BER scheme.

Sustainability aspects
Increased energy efficiency helps lowering GHG emissions. This in turn improves air quality which might have a positive impact on health.

Co-benefits
As a co-benefit, the policy leads to increased employment opportunities for energy assessors, and potentially in the construction sector.
Those investors striving towards a high BER will benefit from a higher resale value of their building.

In Ireland no extensive evaluation of the certification scheme has been done so far, but consumer awareness and attitude surveys show a high level of recognition of the concept of energy certification for buildings among the general public.