The WERS office has been a hive of activity since the last E-news. We have been involved in projects as diverse as working with the NSW Department of Housing, to reviewing the draft 2010 BCA in conjunction with the HIA, continuing our development work on the Sustainable Windows Alliance Project as well as attending meetings to review the National Strategy on Energy Efficiency released by COAG.

NSW Housing
The AWA was approached by the NSW Department of Housing to assist in new development dwellings project. It's is aimed at developing minimum 6 Star energy ratings for public housing as part of the government's stimulus package. We worked closely with NSW housing to ensure AWA and WERS members’ products were used in the project. An expression of interest was sent around to all members and we received expressions of interest from over 60 companies interested. The NSW Department of housing have the list of companies and the projects will be getting under way shortly.

2010 BCA Review
A draft version of the BCA 2010 RIS (Regulatory Impact Statement) was released for public review and comment. Working with the HIA, we reviewed the increased stringency levels under Deemed to Satisfy (Glazing) and their impact on the 6 Star goals. The draft version has reviewed glazing equations which has seen a drop in U value and a small drop in SHGC when compared to the 2009 equations.

Inline with the increase in performance requirements, the AWA developed a capacity and capability study to ascertain if the industry is ready for the change. The Regulatory Impact Statement (DTS Review) and the Survey can be viewed in the members only section.

SWA Project
The SWA project has been covered in past newsletters and publications, but just to recap. The SWA project is an economic model that will produce the energy cost savings and greenhouse gas emission savings when increasing from 3.5 - 9.0 Stars in 0.5 star increments by changing windows alone.

The benefit to the window industry are the advanced equations and results that have been developed along the way. We now have the ability to show what performance of windows are required to move to the various star increments. At WERS we are developing a web based application which will allow users to select a "typical" house design that reflects their house, a climate zone and what their desired house star rating is. The application will then produce a list of WERS windows that will meet or exceed the parameters.

Some of the development since the last meeting has been around the pricing of windows. Part of the economic model is the cost of moving through the star bands. We will be approaching window companies to obtain quotes based on certain performance values and material selections in the coming weeks. The prices will feed into the economic model to show the cost increments and also give the ability to provide payback periods as a result of energy savings.

COAG National Strategy on Energy Efficiency
The COAG (Council of Australian Governments) have approved a document that was developed by various stakeholders. The National Strategy on Energy Efficiency is a plan on how to move forward to reduce Green House gas emissions.

The document is broken up into four key areas; the full document can be downloaded here. An area of interest to the window industry is section 3, "Making buildings more efficient". The section addresses areas of both the residential and commercial sector.

Mandatory Disclosure is also part of the new strategy, with the proposal to commence nationally by May 2011. Mandatory Disclosure of the house energy rating will be required for any sale of a home or if the home is rented. At this stage there is no plan to set a minimum level to be achieved; however there was discussion around the meeting that this may be included in the future.

Already in place in Canberra, the implementation of Mandatory Disclosure is showing that the public may be the promoter of this, as the star ratings are adding value to the sale of the house. A report showed that of two identical houses in the same street, one with 4 stars, one with 5 stars, the 5 star house will sell for around $15,000 more for the extra star (on average).

We are continuing to work on these projects and any new ones that come up. If you would like any further detail or background on any of the topics, please contact me directly.

Mike Palin
WERS Supervisor

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