With the industry reducing operational energy in buildings through more energy efficiency measures, tackling embodied carbon is the next big challenge.

CIBSE believes that there is an urgent need for regulation and, in February, it joined forces with other institutions and construction bodies to send a consistent message to UK political leaders.¹

Together with the UKGBC, IStructE, ICE, CIOB, CIC, RIBA, RICS, ACE, UK Architects Declare, and Part Z, the Institution called on party leaders to commit in election manifestos to reducing construction embodied carbon emissions within two years of taking office. By 2028, it wants them to introduce legal limits on upfront embodied carbon emissions for projects with a gross internal area of more than 1,000m² or more than 10 dwellings.

Embodied carbon is the carbon emissions of a building before it becomes operational. It is associated with materials and construction processes throughout the whole life-cycle of a building, including during the manufacture of building materials, their transportation, and the construction process. It also refers to the carbon produced in maintaining the building and, eventually, demolishing it, transporting the waste and recycling it.

Embodied carbon represents 30% of a building’s total carbon on average, the rest being operational carbon. Our efforts to reduce operational carbon could increase the proportion of embodied carbon to 80% of a building’s total carbon over time.

According to Greater London Authority’s Whole Life-Cycle Carbon Assessment guidance, the embodied carbon of building services in new projects is, on average, 25% – and, in retrofits, up to 75%. This is because of complex systems containing multiple components created using intense manufacturing processes. The use of refrigerants, high replacement rates, and a global supply chain also contribute to high embodied emissions.

Understanding the embodied carbon of products and their components is crucial to creating less carbon-intensive products. This information is usually provided in environmental product declarations (EPDs). However, these are available for few products because of the high cost of producing EPDs due to the complexity of MEP equipment.

CIBSE’s TM65 Embodied carbon in building services: a calculation methodology provides a simple way to estimate the embodied carbon of building services equipment where an EPD is not available. It has been adapted for use in Australia and New Zealand, and two further regional addenda are due in 2024 (USA/Canada/Mexico and UAE).

TM65.1 Embodied carbon in building services: residential heating, published in December 2021, provides the embodied carbon for residential heating systems.

TM65.2 Embodied carbon in building services: lighting, published in August 2023, gives lighters a tool to estimate the embodied carbon of lighting products.

CIBSE is set to launch the next in the series – TM65.3 Embodied carbon in building services: logistics – and one covering HVAC in offices is due later this year.

To reduce embodied carbon, engineers should first reduce the need for MEP kit by prioritising passive design options, and avoid overengineering by carefully considering the design and location of systems. Also avoid oversizing by understanding the building requirements (indoor environment, occupant profiles, HVAC demand cycles) and sizing systems accordingly. We tend to size systems for the worst-case scenario, adding further capacity, which leads to oversizing.

Finally, we need to understand the embodied carbon of products, including reusability and recyclability, to help us select the ones with a lower carbon footprint. By minimising the need for MEP equipment, capital and operational costs can be reduced significantly. Reducing dependence on equipment can also increase the resilience of buildings and the built environment to extreme weather.

Decreasing the use of MEP equipment plays a pivotal role in mitigating the carbon footprint of buildings. This aligns with our decarbonisation goals and supports our efforts to reduce our environmental impact.

References:

1. Embodied carbon regulation – alignment of industry policy recommendations, CIBSE February 2024, bit.ly/ECRFeb2024

The post Why embodied carbon must be regulated appeared first on CIBSE Journal.

Regulations will require minimum technical standards, under a Heat Network Technical Assurance Scheme (HNTAS), for all new-build heat networks from 2025, including the 50,000 residential connections already happening each year. This could rise to 100,000 heat interface units being installed annually in the foreseeable future, partially driven by the regulations themselves.

All 14,000 existing (legacy) heat networks will also be covered, including the 500,000 residential customers currently supplied by heat networks. However, the number of networks is probably a significant underestimate, and improved data could easily indicate there are more like 18,000 legacy networks.

Both communal and district heat networks will be included in the regulations, with the majority of legacy networks being relatively small, communal (single block) networks. The regulations will recognise that many of these communal systems are old and not in the best state of repair, often resulting in poor performance and customer outcomes.

HNTAS is addressing how we can bring these up to a reasonable performance standard over a reasonable period of time. The technical standards will be outcomes-based, so networks will need to meet key performance indicators (KPIs) to gain Heat Network Certification.

For the past 18 months, the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero (DESNZ) has been developing HNTAS, building on CP1 (2020). The work has been led by technical author FairHeat, in partnership with Gemserv, which is focusing on procedural aspects of the assurance scheme.

HNTAS is proposing that a single ‘responsible person’ be accountable for each heat network

Normative documents have now been developed, setting out the necessary governance, structures, procedures and technical standards required to ensure a minimum level of performance and reliability for heat networks.

HNTAS core principles are that the scheme will be outcomes-orientated, preventative, proportionate, deliverable, adaptable, and enforceable. See ‘Assuring quality of heat networks’, CIBSE Journal, May 2023.

The technical normative documents set out clear and measurable KPIs (technical minimum requirements) to be met for each element of a network, plus the evidence required and depth of assessment, along with ‘key failures’ that need to be avoided.

Draft normative documents have been developed in collaboration with sector stakeholders through an extensive series of technical sub-working groups. This involved 25 technical sub-workshops, bringing together 69 stakeholders from 44 diverse organisations, including manufacturers, housing associations, local authorities, consultancies, developers, contractors, energy service companies, trade associations, and professional bodies. This industry engagement will continue with a HNTAS consultation in the summer.

HNTAS’s proposed approach is to certify individual heat networks. Our work-in-progress model is shown in Figure 1. It combines a series of assessment gateways (orange) that, ultimately, lead to certification (blue). Most of the detailed technical assessment work, carried out by registered and trained assessors, will take place across the orange stages, with the clipboards showing assessment points, and the dotted lines as gateways to proceed to the next stage.

The normative documents set out the detailed minimum requirements at each assessment through design, construction and commissioning. These design/construct/commissioning gateways aim to ensure the network is likely to meet future operational performance targets and gain full certification. There is a clear requirement to have binary yes/no decisions, with certification (authorisation to supply heat to customers) awarded to networks that meet minimum technical requirements. By requiring responsible persons to demonstrate that their heat network performance meets KPI thresholds, before allowing a network to pass through each assessment gateway, the scheme is ‘preventative’ and ‘outcomes-based’ (two of the core principles of HNTAS).

This approach aims to ensure that the great majority of heat networks pass at the point of certification, and that key failures in the market are avoided. There are 28 KPIs, categorised into six categories, that set a framework for measuring and monitoring heat network performance. The six categories are: energy centre; district distribution network; thermal substation; communal distribution network; consumer connection; and consumer heat system.

Existing legacy networks will, inevitably, find it harder to meet the HNTAS minimum standards than new networks. So, HNTAS is taking a pragmatic transitionary approach to bring legacy networks as close to full standard as possible, as soon as possible. HNTAS will set out a transition period, during which improvement plans will need to be submitted and minimum levels of metering will need to be installed. Once metering is in place, networks will be in a position to evidence-measure performance accurately and move to full certification.

Fixing legacy networks

For legacy networks, HNTAS aims to ensure the market is able to comply and that the very worst-performing networks are addressed early. To achieve a steady improvement in performance over time, the goal is for every network to be fully certified to a minimum level of performance by a set future date. The proposal for legacy networks is a two-stage transitional approach, which will require minimum levels of metering and monitoring to be installed, followed by the need to report performance, with a minimum threshold that all heat networks must meet within a set period.

Operators will be required to submit a Heat Network Improvement Plan, setting out how they will achieve certification within a set period following the installation of metering, and will need to prove in-use performance after two years of operation, based on real data. It is proposed that networks installed before 2015 will be allowed more relaxed targets than those installed post-2015, when the Heat Networks (Metering and Billing) Regulations came into force.

HNTAS is proposing that a single ‘responsible person’ – such as the owner or developer – be accountable for each heat network. Duty holders of the designated designer, contractor and heat network operator are accountable to the overall responsible person for the day-to-day running of each project stage. This designation of duty-holder responsibilities is similar to the requirements in the Building Safety Act.

The project team is keen to ensure that this is a deliverable scheme, which is proportionate and does not place too much burden or cost on heat network operators or consumers.

During the operational stage, if the network achieves HNTAS minimum performance standards it moves into a stage where the heat network operator regularly submits data to the HNTAS portal (currently being developed), to show that it is still meeting the HNTAS KPIs.

More detailed assessments are only triggered where it falls outside the KPIs. Essentially, this allows a level of ongoing self-assessment for networks that meet minimum performance levels.

Evidence and data requirements will form a ‘golden thread’ throughout all stages of a network’s life, requiring submission of data into the HNTAS and Ofgem digital platforms. It is hoped much of this data submission will be automated, to minimise time and cost.

It is clear that significant change is coming in 2025 as the sector transitions to a regulated heat network market, and setting minimum technical standards is a key part of this. Assessing and certifying heat networks that meet the minimum standards will raise sector performance.

HNTAS is moving into a pilot phase across 2024, to test that it works in practice on real networks, before final implementation in 2025. Engagement with stakeholders throughout this process will continue, as this is key to achieving sector buy-in for the assurance scheme.

There are significant benefits and opportunities that will come from HNTAS: a commercial market for trained and registered assessor services; a general improvement in heat network performance, with consumers seeing improved reliability and service levels; social landlords and local authorities being able to provide more affordable heat; and investors viewing networks as more investable.

There is still a great deal to do to develop heat network regulations, through consultations and secondary legislation. DESNZ aims to publish the HNTAS normative documents in some form this year. HNTAS piloting will take place throughout the year, and DESNZ is seeking heat network operators and assessors that would like to take part. Plans to update CIBSE CP1 are also being put in place, to ensure alignment before regulations are implemented in 2025. A methodology to calculate the carbon content of heat should also be in place by that date.

Heat networks are complex and introducing regulation is not straightforward, so it is important to give this sector early sight of direction of travel. As such, this is a work in progress and does not represent government policy. A DESNZ HNTAS consultation this summer will continue sector engagement, and this work will put in place the missing piece of the heat network jigsaw, namely heat assurance. 

• Based on a paper presented at the 2024 CIBSE Technical Symposium www.cibse.org/symposium

About the authors: 
Professor Phil Jones is an independent consultant working on the DESNZ HNTAS team; Gareth Jones is managing director of FairHeat, the HNTAS technical author

The post Heat networks: countdown to regulation appeared first on CIBSE Journal.

For this interview, which marks his retirement from CIBSE, Hywel was clear he wanted to focus on issues facing engineers in the months and years ahead.

The main concern for engineers, he says, must be with meeting the requirements of the Building Safety Act. He calls it the biggest upheaval facing the construction industry since World War II and has spent much of the past six months explaining to audiences the magnitude of the changes.

Anyone familiar with Hywel’s public speaking will know he is a great orator. He has a skill for communicating the most complex information in a clear and engaging manner, and does so with warmth and wit.   

Having spoken extensively, Hywel is concerned that the industry doesn’t understand the significance of the changes. ‘What worries me is that people think the Building Safety Act is a response to Grenfell and a fire in a block of flats. It isn’t – it’s a wholesale reform of the Building Regulation regime for all buildings, from a studio shed to The Shard,’ he says.

Some sectors are having to come to terms with the safety regime change sooner than others. Last month, the chief executive of Local Authority Building Control, Lorna Stimpson, wrote to the Building Safety Regulator warning that councils would stop providing services unless a deadline for building control officers to prove competence was extended. She said that ‘a significant number of building control professionals will not achieve successful certification and, therefore, registration before the 6 April deadline’. In response, the Health and Safety Executive extended the deadline for passing the assessment by 13 weeks, to 6 July. 

Hywel has sympathy with local authority building control, but feels they were forewarned. ‘I know the public sector is under pressure, but given all that’s happened over Grenfell, and the length of time the public sector has been on notice that things are going to change, I can’t avoid feeling frustrated it got to this point,’ he says.

Another area of irritation is the delay in government response to recommendations in the Independent Review of the Construction Product Testing Regime. However, Hywel says professionals can’t sit and wait for government to devise a new regime. ‘There’s a lot industry can do to take ownership’ he says. ‘Competent engineers shouldn’t be asking civil servants to tell them what to do. People have to demonstrate that they have exercised reasonable skill and care.’

One area of building safety in which there does appear to be engagement is the registering of higher-risk buildings (HRBs), which had to be done by 6 October. Almost 14,000 buildings have been registered – 2,000 more than expected.

Hywel says his Christianity guides his working life

‘It suggests that people out there managing these buildings are paying a bit more attention,’ Hywel says. ‘It’s better than saying “I’m not sure it’s an HRB. I’ll wing it until somebody turns up with a summons”.’

After registering, HRB owners have six months to compile a safety case report that identifies risks to their buildings. People have to look at their building and think ‘what could possibly go wrong’, says Hywel.

As chair of the Building Regulations Advisory Committee, he helped set out the new safety regime, and will continue to be prominent as a member of the Building Advisory Committee, which is responsible for keeping the Building Safety Regulator abreast of emerging issues in the sector.

He was also recently part of the working group that created the guidance on damp and mould for rented housing providers, which followed the death of two-year-old Awaab Ishak as a result of mould in his home.

In addition, Hywel is working for the Construction Industry Council, which brings together professional bodies to speak with one voice. He feels his consensual approach may be the reason his advice is sought. ‘I appear to have this quite unusual status,’ he says. ‘I’m widely respected, trusted for keeping my mouth firmly shut, and apparently have some ability to broker a degree of understanding and consensus between different parties.’

His retirement event was held at St Andrew Undershaft church in the City of London, where Hywel, who has a wife Jackie and three children, has worshipped for 20 years. His faith is an important influence on his attitude to work. ‘Whatever you do, do it with all your strength, as to the Lord. That’s all I try to do in my life,’ he says. ‘If I’ve made a difference, it’s not because I’ve set out to do that, it’s because I’ve tried to do things well.’

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For the first time, the BNG regulation provides a measurable target for the improvement of the natural environment, potentially leading to a wider uptake of nature-based solutions.

There is irrefutable evidence of the positive impact nature has on humans. Benefits include improvement in mental and physical health, increased productivity, mitigation of the urban heat island effect and overheating risk, and better indoor and outdoor air quality.

Nature-based solutions are also key to adapting to and mitigating climate change, by improving flood management and water quality, riverbank erosion, biodiversity, and carbon sequestration. However, nature-based solutions are not widespread.

The House Of Lords Science and Technology Select Committee recently published the report Nature-based solutions: rhetoric or reality?, which looked at their contribution to reaching the UK’s net zero target. It noted that ‘while the government’s ambitions for nature-based solutions are admirable, there is a clear and present danger that they will not be achieved, and this could undermine the target of net zero by 2050’.

One challenge is the perception that green spaces are more costly and require higher maintenance. The lack of quantifiable evidence of social benefits reduces the ability to undertake cost-benefit analysis, and disincentivises government from regulating and funding them.

A key challenge in our industry is quantifying the positive impact of nature-based solutions on the performance of buildings. It is not, for example, easy to model their effectiveness in reducing the urban heat island effect in cities and overheating risk in buildings. A lack of quantifiable evidence could have contributed to the decision not to include green infrastructure as one of the proposed mitigation solutions in the recently introduced Part O – the assessment and mitigation of overheating risk in new homes in England.

How can we overcome the challenges and support the uptake of nature-based solutions? Embed information on their benefits at all levels of professional training and education, but also inform clients, policy-makers and the public.

Identify existing success stories in other countries where policies and initiatives have made a measurable difference. Research industry and policy to quantify benefits, so professionals can better represent the long-term benefits of nature-based solutions and implement them in proposals.

A great initiative by the Climate Change Committee is looking to commission a series of projects to feed into the Climate Change Risk Assessment 4th report analysis. One of the projects will focus on urban heat, looking at the impacts and costs of adaptation at the national, city and building scales (bit.ly/CJHRI24).

A second project will look at the health impacts from extreme heat (mortality, morbidity and impacts on health services). The invitation to tender is due in mid-March 2024, and more information can be found at bit.ly/CJExHe24

The government will be convinced of the benefits of nature-based solutions if they are quantified – for example, increased productivity, health improvements, NHS savings, jobs creation, increased value of building assets, and savings on flood-recovery costs.

Government buy-in is important to implement nature-based solutions at national level (through planning and other policies) and local authority level (by providing resources to implement and regulate urban greening).

The London Plan sets a good example of a local authority requiring all new developments to include urban greening. London has the resources to regulate the implementation of such policy closely, but not all local councils have the funding and knowledge to do the same.

Increasing public understanding of the benefits of green spaces and biodiversity is key to the uptake of nature-based solutions. Changing the narrative from ‘nature for nature’s sake’ to ‘nature for people’ will be fundamental to changing established perceptions.

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He told delegates that current design and build (D&B) procurement methods for higher-risk buildings (HRBs) in the UK would not be possible under new building safety regulations. ‘Design occurring at the same time as construction will not be viable,’ he said. ‘D&B will have to change.’

The reason for the audience’s collective shock is that this form of procurement makes up 58% of contracts in the UK¹. 

The golden thread event was held at The Royal Society, London, shortly before major safety regulations came into force on 1 October. Among the changes that Moore says will force the industry to rethink the use of D&B is the requirement for a ‘dutyholder’ to be responsible for overseeing all aspects of building work through a statutory change control process. The dutyholder could be the client, principal contractor, principle designer, or any other designers or contractors.

Under the new rules for HRBs, any design changes must be documented and managed after the building design has been approved for construction by the BSR, at what is known as Gateway 2. (Gateway 1 is the planning application stage, while Gateway 3 is when the BSR approves the building after construction.) Major changes after Gateway 2 need approval by the BSR before they can be made, which could lead to project delays. Smaller changes deemed ‘notifiable’ can be carried out, but must be flagged with the BSR.

The process doesn’t lend itself to D&B, said Moore: ‘Under the new regime, you have to design it and then build it. D&B for HRBs doesn’t fit in with the methodology.’

David McCullogh, compliance manager at Balfour Beatty, closely studied the Building Safety Act to ensure his company takes the necessary steps to comply with the new regulations. Speaking at the golden thread event, he said he believed D&B procurement for HRBs is possible under the new building safety regime, but that processes would have to change significantly for contractors to comply. 

Regulatory impact

Before the new regulations came into force on 1 October, a principal designer working on a D&B contract could incorporate additional design information, and the contractor would update the construction plan submitted to building control as required. There was no need for further statutory approval from building control if changes were made.

In her independent review, Building a safer future, Dame Judith Hackitt noted that there was ‘no over-arching statutory requirements to report or record changes to previously agreed plans, even where they will have a substantial impact on building safety (or wider Building Regulations requirements)’. She said the lack of oversight meant D&B contracts can often result in ‘uncontrolled, undocumented, and poorly designed changes being made to the original design intent’.

Dame Judith added that building control bodies were overly reliant on the need to ensure positive, open and ongoing relationships with contractors (or sophisticated interventions at the completion stage)’. Under the new regime for HRBs, there is no longer the flexibility to make significant changes without having to go back to the BSR for approval.

Balfour Beatty’s David McCullogh

McCullogh said it was clear that the regulatory changes recommended by Dame Judith do not preclude any particular methods of construction. However, they do place an imperative on clients to tighten up processes to ensure a good understanding of how the project is delivered. ‘It was the thoroughness of design finalisation and timing that she commented on, not the concept itself,’ he added.

McCullogh started his presentation by highlighting the advantages of D&B contracts. ‘D&B has become a very attractive method of procurement for clients because it removes the risk of extra costs associated with design errors from the client and places these with the contractor,’ he said, adding that contractors like it because it allows buildability to be incorporated into the design solutions – for example, synchronicity of design with their supply chains.

David Stevens FCIBSE, director of estates, facilities and capital development at East London NHS Foundation Trust, agreed, saying: ‘D&B makes cost and budget control much clearer, a key factor for public sector or higher education clients.’

Making D&B work for HRBs

For D&B procurement to be viable for HRBs under the safety regime change, McCullogh said ‘minimising, if not completely eliminating, change was essential, as formalised change approval would be expensive and entail time implications’. 

‘If D&B is to continue to be feasible, all design will need to be done in a timely way, and be much more upfront at Gateway 2,’ he added. ‘It is perfectly permissible in the new regulations to have the Gateway 2 information submitted in a phased way, but it is clear that D&B will have to be done in the way it was intended, and not – as has often happened – with work being carried out without design being completed, never mind approved, often dubbed “build and design”.’

McCullogh explained that contractors will have to assemble a capable team, ensuring that every member is competent and has a good understanding of their individual responsibility. ‘Timely, holistic design approaches should replace isolated, siloed practices,’ he said. 

David Stevens, East London NHS Foundation Trust

Construction should be approached in a similar way, especially where compliance is dependent on several mutually dependent trades, such as drylining, service penetrations and firestopping, added McCullogh. ‘Project managers need to shift their focus to manage compliance, not just cost,’ he said.

‘Poor aspects of D&B, where construction may have started prior to finalisation of designs, will no longer occur,’ said Stevens. He believes that the use of two-stage tendering – where a contractor is brought in much earlier – is likely to increase. ‘Under the new act, the design for a new HRB must be complete before construction can commence, but mandatory HRB change control procedures are likely to be lengthy and costly. This means getting it right first time is arguably more achievable with a properly procured and early appointed contractor on board,’ he said. 

Because a D&B team works under a single contract with the project owner, Stevens argued that there is the potential for much better management of the golden thread, especially as contractors are ultimately accountable for delivery of the design, construction and handover. ‘The less moving parts, the better,’ he said. 

McCullogh warned that the BSR will be much stricter about design being signed off before building occurs. ‘Make sure your design is compliant before you put your spade in the ground. Design, design, design: those are my top three priorities, and it’s really at the heart of this new regime.’  

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Those who are accountable for a HRB have a duty to have, and to maintain, accurate, up-to-date and secure information about the building, so they can discharge their duty to manage that building safely. If they already have up-to-date information and a full safety management plan, there will not be a huge amount to do.

These ‘golden thread’ regulations should certainly not surprise anyone responsible for a HRB. It is more than five years since Dame Judith made her recommendations, and four and a half years since the government accepted them in full. This train has been coming for a while now.

For those reasons, many in the sector have been working towards this for several years. They have been busy identifying and bringing together the information they already hold, and updating information where that was needed. There has been a particular focus on the requirement for this information to be held ‘electronically’, for it to be readily available to those who need it, and for it to be exchangeable, especially if management contracts or providers change, or HRBs change ownership. 

An AP is a dutyholder who is responsible for the safety of an occupied HRB under Part 4 of the Building Safety Act. If there is only one AP, they are the principal AP (PAP). Where there is more than one AP, the PAP is the AP responsible for the structure and exterior of the HRB. 

These regulations identify what information the PAP must provide to the regulator, other APs, residents and the fire and rescue authority. There is significant detail, both in the regulations and in Schedule 1, on the information prescribed for the golden thread under section 88(1) of the Building Safety Act. 

The key building information submitted will help the accountable person to assess the building’s safety risks when developing the safety case for the building. It will also help the Building Safety Regulator to determine which HRBs to prioritise when calling in safety case reports to consider granting Building Assessment Certificates. This process is due to begin in earnest in April 2024. 

These new regulations build on the foundations laid by the HRB regulations, published earlier this year. They set out, in detail, what information must be held in the golden thread and the requirements relating to how that information is held, made available, and kept up to date. 

The required information covers fire safety management of the building, including assessment of the major fire safety risks and the measures in place to manage those risks, including physical location of equipment or elements of the fabric – such as a fire door – within the building. 

 It also covers the evacuation strategy for the building, including details of the precautions to be taken by building occupants to reduce the risk of needing to evacuate the building at all. 

The golden thread information includes details of all structural safety measures in the building, relevant reports, and details of the design codes applied to the building when constructed, as well as plans of the building. It will include the assessment of building safety risks as defined in the Building Safety Act, which relate to fire and structural safety, and management of maintenance and repair of the HRB. 

The provision of this information is not unreasonable. Those APs who find these requirements unduly onerous might want to consider whether they have been providing an appropriate standard of management until now. It might not be wise to make too much fuss about the new requirements, as it might only serve to draw attention to previous management standards.

CIBSE is working with the Construction Leadership Council to provide further industry guidance on the regulations and on how APs can meet the new obligations in a safe, reasonable and proportionate manner. It is another step on the road to rebuilding trust in the construction and operation of our higher-rise building stock, and to building a safer future.

Read more articles on the regulations at bit.ly/CJSafety

• Evacuation strategies: Further information on evacuation strategies was recently updated by the government at bit.ly/CJreg9FS

Dr Hywel Davies HonFCIBSE is chief technical officer at CIBSE. He chaired the BRAC Golden Thread working group.

The post Defining the golden thread appeared first on CIBSE Journal.

The government also laid new procedures for the Building Safety Regulator to control work on HRBs, and set out a new regime for the management of all occupied HRBs. For those who have followed the development of building safety law since 2018, there are few surprises.

Before anyone raises their hand and says these regulations are far too complicated to implement in such a short time, they are hardly a surprise. They were first called for by Dame Judith Hackitt’s review more than five years ago, then confirmed when government accepted all her recommendations at the end of 2018. Further indications were contained in the consultation on implementing the report in 2019, before the passage of the Building Safety Act introduced the enabling powers for these procedures in 2022.

The finer points of the dutyholder and competence regime that Dame Judith called for were first set out in November 2021, when draft regulations for competence and dutyholders were issued to give industry early sight. They were discussed in some detail in the consultations on implementing Parts 3 and 4 of the Building Safety Act last summer. All that is happening now is that they are being implemented, as long foretold.

In practice, those who are confident that they are already competent and comply with Building Regulations should not have a major problem complying with these regulations and adapting to the changes. They will be most challenging for those who have been operating at the margins of compliance and who will have to change the way they work.

The government has held its nerve and delivered the regulations as it said it would. Anyone who bet on a U-turn may find it was a costly wager. The regulations are here and come into force on 1 October, and they will fundamentally reform the way that design and construction appointments are made.

They will rebalance responsibilities for building work and are likely to be accompanied by much more robust enforcement, especially where problems emerge on a site. Building Control can be expected to work back from problems to identify how they arose. That, in turn, is likely to call into question the competence of all concerned and compliance with the new duties and competence requirements set out in the new regulations.

Not knowing what the new dutyholder roles, duties and competency requirements are will almost, by definition, demonstrate inadequate knowledge of the regulations and be evidence of inappropriate behaviours, and so a failure to be competent or compliant.

The Building etc. (Amendment) (England) Regulations 2023 introduce the new dutyholder and competence requirements for practitioners and clients. Part 2A introduces a whole series of new regulations – 17 in total – covering the duties, competence and behaviour of clients, designers and contractors.

Part 2A also creates the new roles and duties of the principal designer and contractor for every project. That is correct – they are for every project, because these requirements apply to all buildings. 

Anyone familiar with Dame Judith Hackitt’s 2018 report into Building Regulations and Fire Safety will know that she recommended creating specific roles and responsibilities for clients, designers and contractors doing building work. It should surprise nobody that the first major change to the Building Regulations is the introduction of the new Part on dutyholders and competence.

The regulations revise the rules for deposit of plans and further embed energy-related procedures into UK law. They also strengthen Regulation 38 on the provision of fire safety information, which applies to all building work. If you deal with Building Control in any form, you need to know what these regulations require, starting this October.

If you are responsible for managing an occupied HRB, or for managing building work in, or to create, a new HRB, there are two new sets of regulations. The Building (Higher-Risk Buildings Procedures) (England) Regulations 2023 set out the new Building Control system for HRBs in detail, implementing Part 3 of the Building Safety Act.

These regulations will come into force in October, with a transitional period of six months for work already under way. These are explained in more detail in a series of articles on the Journal website. It will explain the major changes to Part 3 of the Building Regulations as they apply to all building work, and summarise new procedures for control of works to HRBs.

The Higher-Risk Buildings (Management of Safety Risks etc) (England) Regulations 2023 apply to all HRBs in occupation. They implement many of the provisions enabled by Part 4 of the Building Safety Act 2022, covering the operational management of HRBs.

They introduce requirements on Accountable Persons to hold accurate, up-to-date information about their building(s) in electronic form, to keep it up to date and use that information to make a safety assessment about the building and then demonstrate the control measures/management systems they have in place to proactively manage the risks.

The regulations also have a firm focus on resident engagement, making sure that those responsible for resident safety are actively talking and listening to residents, and that they have a complaints procedure should issues arise. Again, there is nothing here that has not been well signalled over a period of years.

It is becoming a cliché, but this really is the biggest change in Building Regulations since World War II. These reforms will change the way the industry is regulated. The onus will fall on everyone to demonstrate compliance and maintain the evidence, not on a Building Control officer to find non-compliance.

While there are new and more rigorous rules for HRBs, the Building Regulations are for all building work, without exception. The industry now has a huge opportunity to demonstrate a willingness to embrace these reforms and rebuild public trust in what we do. It will not be easy or quick, but it needs to be done.

Bodies such as CIBSE will be working with the Construction Leadership Council and its constituent bodies to provide further guidance on these regulations, and on how clients, principal designers, contractors and Accountable Persons can meet the new obligations in a safe, reasonable and proportionate manner.

It is another step on the road to rebuilding trust in the construction and operation of our high-rise building stock, and another step on the road to building a safer future.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Dr Hywel Davies is a former chair of the Building Regulations Advisory Committee who has worked in the field of regulations and standards for over 35 years. He is chief technical officer of the Chartered Institution of Building Services Engineers and an Honorary Fellow of CIBSE.

Other articles by Hywel Davies on the Building Safety Act

Building control for Higher Risk Buildings The Building (Higher-Risk Buildings Procedures) (England) Regulations 2023 coming into force on 1 October set out the building control processes for higher risk buildings that will apply to new projects

Role of Accountable Persons How Accountable Persons will need to develop the building safety case required by new regulations coming  into force on 1 October for management of higher risk buildings under Part 4 of the Building Safety Act 2022.

The key requirements of the Golden Thread Under new regulations coming into force on October 1, Delivering the Golden Thread for a project requires close attention to any changes to the design during construction.

Notices for work New rules for the deposit of plans has been introduced by the Building Regulations (Amendments etc) (England) Regulations 2023. They apply to all building work and they come into force on 1st October.

Duties and competence The Building Regulations (Amendments etc) (England) Regulations 2023 inserts a new Part 2A into the Building Regulations 2010, which has  requirements on clients to appoint designers and contractors who are competent. There are also new duties for clients, designers and contractors

Inspections and information Dame Judith Hackitt’s review of building regulations and fire safety exposed almost total failure to provide fire safety information under Regulation 38 of the Building Regulations. The changes to the Building Regulations which come into force on 1 October provide much greater clarity on provision of fire safety information as well as commissioning reports for all building work

• Read more new articles on the regulations, including a new Part on dutyholders and competence, at
  bit.ly/CJSafety

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More often, powers granted under section 2(2) of the (now repealed) European Communities Act 1972 were used to make regulations to transpose EU directives into UK law. That mechanism was employed for the Energy Savings Opportunity Scheme (ESOS) and the Energy Performance of Buildings Regulations, which implemented aspects of EU Energy Policy introduced more than a decade ago. 

The Energy Bill, just completing its passage through parliament, transfers arrangements for the ESOS and the energy performance regulations firmly into UK law. Part 10 enacts the ‘power to make energy performance regulations’. Paragraph (1) enables the Secretary of State to make regulations for either: 

(a) enabling or requiring energy usage or efficiency of premises to be assessed, certified and publicised 

(b) enabling or requiring possible improvements in the energy usage or efficiency of premises to be identified and recommended.

There are also powers to restrict or prohibit marketing and sale of property where energy performance has not been assessed, certified or publicised. 

This will enable the department responsible for energy policy to regulate energy efficiency and usage across the whole building stock. It provides a firm legal basis for extending the current coverage of energy certificates for public buildings in use to all buildings, whether using the same methodology or developing new ones. 

The powers also explicitly include regulating ‘the anticipated energy usage and energy efficiency of new premises’. This means that, as well as meeting the requirements of Part L of the Building Regulations, there may, for certain types of buildings, be additional requirements relating to energy use in operation – something that has never been done using the Building Regulations, although the legal basis for doing so has often been debated. That debate is now closed, as government has those powers and they do not sit with the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities or the new Building Safety Regulator.

The bill also creates new sanctions for those who fail to comply, with fines of up to £15,000 and, in some cases, imprisonment for up to a year. This nails another long-standing debate over the previous regime under building and energy performance regulations, which has never knowingly been enforced.

Part 11 of the bill creates the enabling framework for future ESOS schemes (and is clear that there may be more than one scheme). The Secretary of State may regulate ‘for the establishment and operation of one or more energy savings opportunity schemes’. These may impose obligations as listed below:

Potential obligations in energy schemes

• Enable or require energy consumption or consequential greenhouse gas emissions for which an undertaking is responsible to be assessed, audited, reported and published
• Enable or require possible energy savings or emissions reductions to be identified and recommended; enable or require costs and benefits of those energy savings or emissions reductions to be assessed
• Encourage or require plans or targets for achieving energy savings or emissions reductions
• Encourage or require action to achieve energy savings or emissions reductions
• Encourage or require the achievement of energy savings or emissions reductions. 

This is heady stuff and could give a future government significant powers to intervene with renewed energy in the activities of businesses. It will enable the plans, consulted on last year, to strengthen the ESOS regime for its next phase. Taken together, these two unheralded parts of the bill create a much more robust regime for regulating energy use of buildings in operation.

Anyone involved in the current ESOS is strongly advised to download the bill (or act) and read Part 11. It will constitute an hour’s CPD at least, and give a clear view of the direction in which this policy is likely to go. 

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The Building Safety Regulator is now up and running, with various duties relating to building safety. Its first priority is the safety of Higher-Risk Buildings (HRBs).

There is a specific definition of occupied HRBs in the Building Safety Act and accompanying regulations, which is: a multi-residential building more than 18m in height or of seven storeys or more. These regulations set out the description in detail, and further regulations set out the requirement to register existing HRBs by 30 September this year.

The regulator is also responsible for the building control function of new HRBs. Exact timings have not been announced, but the Act requires the regulator to act as the building control body on all new HRBs once the relevant regulations come into force – and all new HRBs will be required to go through the new Gateway process.

Planning Gateway One (PGO) is also up and running, with some interesting statistics emerging from the regulator suggesting that more than 50% of submissions at PGO are being rejected because they do not address key building safety concerns.

Gateway 2 will require that the full design of the HRB is completed and approved by the regulator before any construction work begins on site. This is a challenge, not least for procurement models that go to site with significant ‘contractor designed portions’ awaiting design. Put simply, that won’t get past first base – or, more accurately, Gateway 2.

Gateway 2 will require those responsible for the submission to show the detailed design working and explain how they think the submitted design meets Building Regulations, particularly the functional requirements. This is a new stipulation, and given the teething problems with PGO, we can expect to see more problems when Gateway 2 goes live.

In addition to getting the design signed off at Gateway 2, there will be further requirements. The client will need to provide submissions showing how they plan to manage and resource construction on site, as well as a change-control plan to manage – and get approved – any design changes as construction progresses.

To complete the package, there will be a need to set out the competence of the team appointed to undertake the work.

The regulator will want to dig into all of these and to see the workings clearly – how do the client and principal designer show they have competent people delivering a fully compliant design to a realistically resourced schedule? If they are not convinced by the workings, they won’t let work begin.

The expectation is that the client will set out who is in their team, starting with the principal designer, but including all of those appointed to the project. They will demonstrate why they think those appointed are competent and provide the evidence to support that conclusion.

There is a real need here to show the workings and the basis of the decision to appoint a specialist or a more general consultant. Do they have the knowledge, skills, experience and behaviours to undertake the role safely and effectively? Have they got what it takes to deliver a safe HRB? The regulator will want to see how this conclusion is reached – and we can expect a similar mindset in other aspects of building control as the Act comes into force more fully.

References:

1. The Higher-Risk Buildings (Descriptions and Supplementary Provisions) Regulations 2023. These set out what constitutes ‘key building information’ in respect of Higher-Risk Buildings (HRBs) bit.ly/CJHRBREGS
2. Building Safety (Registration of Higher-Risk Buildings and Review of Decisions) (England) Regulations 2023. These make provisions about the register of HRBs held by the building safety regulator, and about making an application to register an HRB, and further provisions about decisions of the regulator that may be subject to a review under section 25 of the Building Safety Act. bit.ly/CJBSReg

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The regulations set out the high-level key building information that the principal accountable person (PAP) – responsible for the repair of the structure and exterior of a building – will have to give the Building Safety Regulator (BSR). They also clarify the individual responsibilities of multiple accountable persons for the different parts of a higher-risk building (HRB).

The key building information required includes the high-level information needed by the BSR to enable them to fulfil several roles set out in the Building Safety Act. It will allow analysis of trends and risks in high-rise residential buildings, and prioritisation of assessment of the fire and structural safety in existing high-rise residential buildings. This will assist the regulator in deciding when to call in and assess the safety-case report for that building.  

The regulations describe the key building information as being: information about the principal use of the building and any subsidiary uses (which will identify mixed-use buildings); details of any ancillary building that is attached to the HRB, but not a part of it; and details of outbuildings and basements. 

It also includes the number of staircases and storeys in the building, materials used in the external walls and roof, and any fixtures attached to the walls. In addition, it will require details of the structure, energy supplied to the building, and any energy-storage system. Finally, details of the evacuation strategy and fire and smoke control equipment will be needed. 

The key building information will have to be supplied to the regulator as part of the PAP’s application for registration of their HRB, although they will have 28 days from submitting the application to supply the key information. The PAP has a statutory duty to provide this information. It is worth noting that registration is due to open in April, with a six-month window for existing HRBs to apply for registration. So, all existing HRBs will need to have this information before October this year.

Information will have to be submitted digitally, in a format or by a specific mechanism to be set out by the regulator. The regulations expressly enable the regulator to specify a website address.

These regulations do not fully describe everything that will be required in the golden thread, but are a start and give a clear steer to PAPs about what they will have to register in buildings as accountable persons.

Where more than one accountable person is involved in ownership or operation of a higher-risk building, it is vital to clarify which accountable person is responsible for each part of the building. Ownership of residential buildings is not always simple and clear, leading to multiple accountable persons, with complex lease arrangements dictating complicated repairing responsibilities for different parts of the building. 

The regulations will enable all of those involved in managing building safety in a higher-risk building to identify which accountable person is responsible for a particular part of a building in relation to their responsibilities under the Building Safety Act. They also allow the new Building Safety Regulator to identify who is responsible for the different parts of a building.

These are the second set of regulations – after those that set the scope of ‘higher risk buildings’ in December – that relate to the new regime for building safety, with further regulations to follow. We can now clearly see the details coming into place to implement the biggest changes to regulation of residential buildings since World War II. Anyone responsible for a higher-risk building has eight months to collate and submit this information. It is now time to act on building safety.

Further reading:

1. High-Risk Buildings, (Key Building Information etc.) (England), Regulations 2023, bit.ly/CJFeb23HD1
2. Explanatory Memorandum to the Higher-Risk Buildings,(Key Building Information etc.) (England), Regulations 2023, bit.ly/3je2EEV
3. Consultation on the new safety regime for occupied higher-risk buildings, DLUHC, bit.ly/3XDiojH

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