Late on Wednesday evening, Windows Active was reporting that the BFRC are indeed about to introduce another “+” band to the top of the WER certificate. We all expected it. So it came as no shock to read the news that it was happening. But it does also confirm that the WER system has nowhere else to go than to continue to keep adding +’s.

No other options for BFRC

I have written on here plenty of time that the WER scheme has been flawed from the start. I understand why the decision was made to chose the WER certificate system over U-Values, as the branding was more recognisable to homeowners. But there seemed little provision made for any further changes to the certification and ensuring they looked credible.

We now have a situation where for every band of ten a window rises, the BFRC have to add an extra + to the end of the A rating. Even now though, when you see mock-ups of the new certificate to be issued, seeing the A++ already looks a bit daft.

How many more +’s will be required in the coming years? Window technology is only going to get better. Companies aren’t going to stop developing their products. So the only choice the BFRC have is to keep adding +’s. Lets hope we don’t get windows going beyond A+50 or A+60!

Aren’t WERs going to be scrapped?

You might remember a little while ago I wrote about the possibility that window energy ratings in the UK could be scrapped under new EU directives being mulled over in Brussels. The reality of the matter is that when the EU mulls things over, they tend to go ahead and do it anyway. So for me it is highly likely that EU will decide to take over and impose their own, Europe-wide energy ratings scheme, which ironically is going to look very similar to our own.

So you might wonder why the WER scheme is being continued to be updated. Well any changes made, like the ones the EU are proposing, will take a good two to three years to actually take effect. So in the meantime we have to stick with what we have, whether we like it or not.

Please can’t we just have U-Values?!

I really do not want to see a situation in a couple of years time where an A rated window ends up having six +’s stuck on the end to demonstrate a window that is A+60 or better. It will look totally ridiculous and the homeowner will fail to take something like that seriously.

If it were me, I would make U-Value the sole mark of energy efficiency compliance. It’s a scale of measurement that can be easily adapted as window efficiency gets better. Most of us trust the maths involved with U-Value. Most of us were brought up in the industry on U-Values.

Thanks to better information and the web, I don’t believe U-Values and it’s understanding is as alien to homeowners as some might believe. I have had many people in our showroom fully aware of what U-Values are what what constitutes a good one or a bad one.

How many +’s will we get before the EU takes it all away and replaces it with their own? Who knows. I’m putting my money on four.

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