EWI Pro offering compliant products for the Green Homes Grant scheme

In July 2020, the UK Government announced a new green homes grant scheme, which would give homeowners and landlords typically up to £5,000 of funding towards energy saving measures to install on their properties. The scheme is due to launch in September 2020, with external wall insulation being one of the key energy measures that home occupiers will be able to take-up to significantly improve the thermal comfort of homes.

How EWI Pro’s products are compliant with the Green Homes Grant scheme

EWI Pro Insulation Systems are a system designer of specialist external insulation and thin coat render systems. The Green Homes Grant scheme we believe will make key requirements on the applicators and products that are allowable under the scheme. Although the full details are still to be released, we believe the onus on the manufacturers will be as per the recommendations made in the Bonfield Review. The review published the “Trustmark” for key actors in a new retrofit framework, which is also called PAS 2035.

Under the PAS 2035 framework, the onus on external wall insulation products are that they must be certified to BBA standards. EWI Pro Insulation Systems has two systems that are certified to the BBA, which are our EPS EWI System and the Mineral Wool EWI System. The BBA is the British Board of agreement and certifies the products and systems, so they are “fit-for-purpose” for the retrofit improvements that are being recommended.

In their testing of the systems, the BBA carries out a set of robust tests that examine the products for their longevity, fire resistance, water penetration and many more. All the products and systems are rigorously tested in the respective factories that produce them so that the quality control in maintained at all times.

In addition, we at EWI Pro do a full life cycle tracking of our products and systems. This means that were something to go wrong in the process (from production to post installation), we can go back through our controls and examine the product batches, recipes and logistic procedures to come up with forward decisions that will keep our customers informed.

EWI Pro assisting our installers through the PAS 2035 Framework

Although not yet formally announced, we believe that the Green Homes Grant will require applicators to install the external wall insulation measure according to the PAS 2035. First of all, if you are looking to install external wall insulation, the frame stipulates that you have work with a supplier that has BBA certification in place. As mentioned above we have certification for both EPS and Mineral Wool.

We will also help the installer to meet the measure specific PAS 2030 requirements of the job – this is the installer specific part of the overall PAS 2035 framework. Looking at the PAS 2030 standards, they require the installer installing external wall insulation to follow the measure specific

requirements set out in the annexes. Briefly here are the key activities set out in the regulations for external wall insulation and where EWI Pro can help:

• The installer organisation be trained to the system and have the individual applicators carded by the manufacturer,
• Produce a design specification for the retrofit jobs,
• Calculate the u-value and condensation risk for every job (EWI Pro is certified as a competent organisation to carry out these assessments),
• Be able to produce pull out data for fixings (working together with fixing and fastener manufacturers, EWI Pro can help produce calculations for any site around the country),
• Produce a product handover and maintenance guide,
• Facilitate 25-year manufacturers guarantees,
• Introduce the installer organisation to an insurance backed or industry warranty scheme.

EWI Pro adding further value to our key stakeholders

We realise that the Government are about to launch a flagship retrofit and home energy improvement scheme and it is up to the industry to add as much value to our installers and end customers.

At EWI Pro we are always looking for ways to increase transparency and offer the following “value enhancing” services to our installer network:

• Site visits by our Technical Sales Managers, helping specify the correct system and ensuring the customer has “confidence” in the products installed to the property,
• Technical monitoring during the installation process – our team will also audit a selection of projects being installed with the EWI Pro products, to ensure quality and minimise bad practice,
• System drawings including our standard detailing as well as customised drawings to provide for more complex project requirements,
• Prospect support, by offering new projects that have been specified with EWI Pro,
• Installer portal – a self-service electronic service designed to manage invoices, deliveries and warranty applications,
• Pro Points – our loyalty scheme designed to give back to the most loyal installer.

To the end customer we have the following “value enhancing” tools to drive every increasing trust in our products and services:

• A materials calculator – this gives the end user an idea of the material quantities required for the job,
• Façade colour tool – the end user can virtually pick any colour in the spectrum and have this installed onto their property. The colour tool can take any property and virtually transform it before any applicators comes on site or job is agreed,
• Unparallel resources, whether it is our installer guides, product data sheets or ancillary catalogues giving the end customer important information about external wall insulation systems.
• Technical support – we are happy to come to site by sending out one of our representatives, who with the chosen installer can get into the finer details of the whole installation and retrofit process.

Green Homes Grant launching in the Autumn of 2020

Although we expect the Government to launch the Green Homes Grant scheme in September, we do appreciate that with £1.5 billion of funding is no small figures and its proper administration is the key to make this scheme a success. We will keep any updates posted on this page, therefore please stay tuned.