Enhanced Capital Allowances.

[Argus]

Is the world beating a path to your door to buy systems on the Energy Technology List in preference to the rest, or is it still a case that the cheapest is installed?
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[Peter_1]

What is the Energy Technology List?

[Argus]

Sorry Peter, I should have mentioned that this is a UK only initiative.

The energy Technology List is a searchable database of equipment of all kinds (including Heat Pumps) that qualify for the UK government's ECA scheme, which is a tax break for energy efficient equipment.

http://www.eca.gov.uk/etl/search.asp...01000200010001

It?s one of the UK?s Kyoto mechanisms. In short, it allows companies to write off all the tax on nominated products in the first year, instead of on a sliding scale over 10 years.
As far as heat pumps are concerned it can be worth roughly the equivalent of 30% of the cost of the equipment up front in the first year.

It also applies to refrigeration systems, VSD leak detectors etc.

I would be interested to hear what you have in your country that is similar.
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[Brian_UK]

Argus, Aiyub had a thread about this one a little while ago, try here
http://www.refrigeration-engineer.co...ital+allowance
to catch some of the other comments.

[Argus]

Thanks, Brian.
Yes indeed, I remember it. The thread veered off to the subject of leasing AC equipment, which when all is said and done is a small part of a small sector of the UK Market.

I was considering the wider aspect, because the ECA scheme covers a great many other products which are unlikely to be leased, including pumps, compressors, leakage detection systems, head pressure amplifiers etc. Much of this is industrial equipment and likely to be high value.
Added to this is the policy of local government and public / private finance initiatives to select from the ETL in preference.
It?s easy to dismiss these initiatives for small value claims on small split system, but for specifiers they are a serious consideration. In many cases it's enough to exclude a lot of products from the tender list.

The UK is involved with the EU members on a common approach to Carbon emissions, so it is likely that other EU states will have similar schemes, I?m interested to see how they work in other countries. What?s happening in Belgium, Peter?
I know that France has a new initiative going, apart from Vivrelec, is anything else happening? Holland? Spain, Germany?
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[Peter_1]

In Austria, the electricity company sells 'heat' with GSHP.
Almost 70% of the new heating installations in homes are with a GSHP.
The company makes the total GSHP investment and you make a contract with the company. You then pay a certain amount/kWh. In this price, you pay per kWh a small part for the electricity cost and another part for the unit.
The price is coupled on the actual electricity unit price and - we call it here in Belgium - the index. This is a value, which calculates what the most needed goods costs in daily life, and wages are coupled to this index. So if coffee prices rises and bread prices rises for example, then above a certain level the index trips to a higher level and the wages can go up.

They - the Austrians - guarantee you a maximum needed consumption for the heating. You can call it some sort of leasing.
At the end you can prolong the contract or buy the installation.

Here in Belgium, they pay for a heat pump +/- 250 to 225 €/HP (compressor HP) The minimum COP has to be 3, the heat pump must be the main heating source.
See now they cancelled this for 2005.
You also get subsidized for frequency inverters, 1 kW pays 124 €, 5 kW/115€, 10 kW/105 € and so on till 100 kW (3750 €)

There is a motion in the Parliament to regulate the HVACR world with exams, something like in the UK and Australia. But as with many things here, the final law can last for some years before it becomes effective. Three different governments must agree for this.

It is in fact so that if you want to start something in the HVACR business, you need to be registered. But if you’re let’s ay a carpenter and you start your business in this job, that’s of course OK. If you then switch afterwards to something HVACR relates and don’t tell this to the government and there are no complaints about your job, then they leave you alone. As long as you pay your taxes is everything OK. So it’s regulated in some way but there is no control at all.

Belgium has signed the Kyoto and Montreal agreement and try to follow this. There is no special Belgium regulation. One of the reasons why they subsidise frequency inverters (FI) is that they then can say that there are ‘x’ FI installed and that those save ‘y’ CO emissions without even calculating this or verifying if there is a relation between the installed FI and the actual savings for the environment.

[Argus]

Thanks Peter. That?s quite a list.

It seems to me that although the EU has a combined approach to the Kyoto agreement, individual member states are following their own agendas. There is no combined or structured plan for carbon reduction measures in the EU.

As far as the UK is concerned, there are a number of measures concerned with energy efficiency. Grant schemes are a difficult area because European Commission approval is needed for any fiscal measure s that can be construed as ?State Aid? or subsidies.

1. Carbon Trading is still in its infancy and seems to favours only the largest industrial users.
2. A Carbon Tax is attached to commercial energy use in the UK, but excludes domestic consumers. Watch this space because it is set to grow, I believe.
3. The GSHP market is miniscule and likely to remain so, despite a government grant scheme. Called ?Blue Skies?. It offers a grant toward the installation of GSHP of (I believe) around ?1200 per installation (about ?1800). In Scotland there is a different legislature, and this grant is around ?4000 (?6000) but includes a sign up to Green Energy that comes at a premium price. The price, payback period and general apathy in the areas of building designers will ensure that GSHP will remain small beer. It doesn?t have to be, but that?s the way it is in this country.
4. Variable Speed Drives (inverters) attract a Tax rebate under the ECA scheme I mentioned earlier, but it is a fixed sum, depending on the size of the motor driven.
5. The remainder is ECAs for energy efficient equipment of all types. The energy levels for Heat pumps are set at Energy class ?C? in both modes as defined in the Energy Labeling directive. This will increase to Minimum ?B? in August 2006.

Regulation of users and technicians is a different issue. As far as regulation of practitioners in RAC is concerned the F Gas directive will carry requirements with it that will overlap the ODS Regulation and require minimum levels of qualifications. In many states at the moment they range from a high level of competence and regulation, (Holland is a good example because the scheme there is mature) to almost non existent. There are, for example, no MANDATORY qualification levels for refrigeration Air Conditioning technicians in the UK at the moment. This does not mean that there is no one with formal qualifications; far from it. It means that anyone can buy a set of gauges and a gas bottle and start working.

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