F ber rating for a building built in 2000

Cilar

Just got the ber rating for a one-bed apt I was planning to buy. F rating, which is quite surprising as the building was built in 2000, and I thought building reg from that time would push the ber higher (at minimum D, or E1)
- I've not got the survey yet - should I suspect some fundamental issues with the walls, floor given the very low rating relative to the age of the building?
- Is there a way to understand what is the main cause of the f rating? I've got the advisority document, I see open cheminey, electricity rating, no energy saving lighting, some u values for the walls and floor, but hard to quantify which is the main contributor of the rating.
i see the ber rating for an apt upstair is E1, are such difference exected in the same building?

MOTM

Cilar wrote: »

Just got the ber rating for a one-bed apt I was planning to buy. F rating, which is quite surprising as the building was built in 2000, and I thought building reg from that time would push the ber higher (at minimum D, or E1)
- I've not got the survey yet - should I suspect some fundamental issues with the walls, floor given the very low rating relative to the age of the building?
- Is there a way to understand what is the main cause of the f rating? I've got the advisority document, I see open cheminey, electricity rating, no energy saving lighting, some u values for the walls and floor, but hard to quantify which is the main contributor of the rating.
i see the ber rating for an apt upstair is E1, are such difference exected in the same building?

Is this a small ground floor apartment heated by electricity? Give details pls.

sydthebeat

The main contributor to the bad rating is electric heating.

F isn't unusual for an electrically heated apartment from 2000

Cilar

Wow, thanks for the quick answers Yes, it's electricity heated (storage heater), and open cheminey, ground floor, end of terrace. I can give the BER number and myhome.ie ads if that's allowed. So lots of drawbacks, and I fully expected the rating to be low, but not that low given the age of the building, and the fact that I saw a second floor apartment in same building (under the roof) at E1 rating, not sure what make sure a big difference. I could not see any other apartment at F rating from that time on myhome.ie, they're between D and E, hence the 'shock'.

Additional details: 57m^2, double glazing.

That's putting me quite off to buy the apartment, the apartment is large and nice, but just worried about not being able to sell it back in a few years time if needed (kids!) - and trying to understand if that's fixable (say go to a D rating at least). I'm not too worried about the electricity bills, I've been renting that apt for 2 years now, and that's bearable (160 euros of ESB for 2 months in winter) as I'm only at home in evenings (turned off storage heater and just use convector heating the few hours I'm at home in the evening).

The advisory document is not precise enough - I suppose the first and cheapest things would be to seal the cheminey and put energy saving lights, and secondary glazing for the windows, but I cannot quantify the gain in term of BER rating. Is there any software or calculator that could give the exact gain for each modification?

sydthebeat

An end of terrace ground floor apartment could have three walls and a floor which loses heat.
The second floor apartment may have only two walls. The roof insulatIon may be viSible and quantifable whereas a floor is not.
So immediately the grOund floor apartment May have 100% more heat loss area.

Also, the total area of the open plan kitchen Dining living space has a huge impact on the rating. I've seen one apartment where the living fraction has been as high as 75%. As the living space is deemed to be heated three degrees Higher than the rest, the larger the living fraction the worse the rating.

Apartments are actually quite difficult to rate correctly, more awkward than a standard semi d anyway.

Cilar

Thanks - I've been playing with the "DEAP" application here http://www.seai.ie/Your_Building/BER/BER_Assessors/Technical/DEAP/ ... quite interesting. Is it possible to get access to the DEAP assessment file (xml) for a given BER number for non-assessors? That would give the exact details. It's requesting a NAS login.

sydthebeat

Cilar wrote: »

Thanks - I've been playing with the "DEAP" application here http://www.seai.ie/Your_Building/BER/BER_Assessors/Technical/DEAP/ ... quite interesting. Is it possible to get access to the DEAP assessment file (xml) for a given BER number for non-assessors? That would give the exact details. It's requesting a NAS login.

no its not possible.

fclauson

if you get the full BER report (rather than the one pager) you can back work the numbers to come in close if not exact to the BER assessment

alternatively find a locally friendly BER assessor and work with them to re-do the assessment in the Excel version

caesarthechimp

I don't think there is any actual rule prohibiting the original assessor from releasing a copy of the xml file. The problem is there is no real upside for him/her, and the possible downside is that you will find some small fault in it and complain about it.
Especially if the request is from someone who might be capable of predicting the future electricity delivered:primary energy factor ratio from the SEAI algorithm. No harm in asking though.

sydthebeat

caesarthechimp wrote: »

I don't think there is any actual rule prohibiting the original assessor from releasing a copy of the xml file. The problem is there is no real upside for him/her, and the possible downside is that you will find some small fault in it and complain about it.
Especially if the request is from someone who might be capable of predicting the future electricity delivered:primary energy factor ratio from the SEAI algorithm. No harm in asking though.

well when i said no i was referring to a cleint getting access to teh xml file through NAS.

The client actually has a right to the xml file under SI 666, so they would have to request it from the assessor.


see page 5 here