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Energy Efficiency Rating, what is it?
Boilers, like most home appliances, now have energy efficiency ratings and they are arranged under the Seasonal Efficiency of Domestic Boilers scheme, or SEDBUK for short.
Rules brought in during 2005 within the Building Regulations now state that new boiler within a new installation must be the most efficient available today. In other words, it must be more than 86% efficient. And the main kind of boiler that is efficient is a condensing boiler, which uses two heat exchangers (which take the heat from the burning of the fuel and passes it into the water), as opposed to one used in conventional boilers. The second heat exchanger in a condensing boiler captures the heat in the flue gases.
The problem with a condensing boiler is that it may be more efficient, but the downside is that the by-product of capturing the exhaust gases is a large amount of liquid which has to be removed from the boiler using pipes and drains.
Of course, in certain circumstances, it might be appropriate (legal) for an old boiler to be replaced with a non-condensing type, but only if it is impossible to fit a condensing boiler and accommodate the flue, which has to be on an outside wall, and also allow room for the waste water pipes.
So, your boiler of choice has to be, in effect, an A, or B rating, which means that it has to be 86% efficient. You might ask how do they calculate the efficiency of a given boiler, but nearly every boiler available today was tested within the SEDBUK and rated in terms of their efficiency, given a whole range of criteria. A SEDBUK rating represents an average annual efficiency rating of a domestic boiler which runs in a typical house, having made certain assumptions including usage pattern, control mechanisms and climate.
The resulting ratings look like this, seven bands which run from A, the most efficient, to G, the most inefficient:
SEDBUK Range Band
90% + A
86% - 90% B
82% - 86% C
78% - 82% D
74% - 78% E
70% - 74% F
- 70% G
So, every boiler available today has a SEDBUK rating and if you wish to find out more about your new, or old boiler (if it’s listed See Our Boiler Search ), or go to:http://www.sedbuk.com.
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