Glossary

Explaining the words and acronyms. Glossary

1. Energy Saving Devices (ESDs):
2. EPC:  the Energy Performance Certificate.  All houses being sold must get one of these. It costs £20-50 using tick boxes. Often 5 pages including some concerning CO2 release.
3. PV Panels.  The photovoltaic panels, generally on the roof of the house that convert sunlight into electricity and then either putting it into the Grid, or saving it in batteries
4. ASHP.  Air Source Heat Pumps that take some energy from outside air and use this to heat internal water and central heating. This can be also done using ground source heat pumps (GSHP).
5. MVHR.  Mechanical Ventilation with Heat Recovery.  This takes air from rooms inside the house and uses its heat to warm up clean air that is pumped into the house.  Air becomes dryer, less associated with mould.  Called HRU  in the image.
6. Insulation systems.  These are well known, have specific standards, can be put on the outside (expensive) or inside of a house. In a terraced house this may take 2-3 weeks
7. ‘Valuers’ of a property are professionally trained to assess the amount of money that a house will attain on the current market.  IVSA is  The Independent Surveyors and Valuers Association
8. Assessors and Surveyors. People working for potential house buyers to give either simple or full reports as to the condition of the building.
9. Double Glazing or Triple Glazing (DG or TG) retains heat inside the house and yet permits light.
10. Academic References. These are researched and published documents checked and edited for the academic community to be able to rely on.  To see the whole document: open ‘google scholar’  and write in the name of the author with a hyphen between the surname and the first letter of christian name.  Allow it to search for that and the article will appear in a list.
11. IWI.  Internal wall insulation.  Generally as cavity wall insulation (CWI) or by removing the plasterwork on the inside of external walls and replacing it with studs and insulated plasterwork.
12. LA.  Local Authority
13. CWI. Cavity Wall Injection.  This is relatively cheap and clean but cannot take place where walls are damp or any driving rain allows the external wall to remain wet. Difficult to remove particularly if foam or polystyrene balls used.
14. Grant.  A grant comes from the Government or Local Authority to make sure that the work takes place. grants seen in page Biggest Costs