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Combustibles ban will prevent boiler replacements in high rises, manufacturers fear
Boiler manufacturers have raised fears that the government’s ban on combustible materials on the outside of high-rise buildings will prevent boilers from being replaced on those buildings, Inside Housing can reveal.
A letter – seen by Inside Housing – from Dr Elaine Lancaster, chief technical officer at Ideal Boilers, says that because boilers use a flue made from combustible material that runs up the outer wall of a building, it would be banned under the new regulations.
Ideal Boilers is one of the UK’s largest boiler manufacturers and last year had a turnover of £260m.
The government’s ban on combustibles, brought in last November, prevents the use of any combustible materials in any element of the external wall.
It was intended to prevent the use of combustible cladding and insulation on high-rise buildings and was brought in to prevent a repeat of the Grenfell Tower fire, which killed 72 people in June 2017.
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According to Dr Lancaster’s letter, which was sent to a number of local authorities, the ban will also cover “all boilers on the market today”, as they all use combustible materials in their flues.
This, she wrote, means that no boiler replacements in any high-rise residential buildings are legal, nor can new boilers be added to new high rises.
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Dr Lancaster added in her letter: “The government department responsible for the regulation, the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government [MHCLG], has started a review into the flue situation, but we [are] advised this could take six to nine months and [it] is unclear whether this will be a stay of execution or a permanent exemption, as is already in place for certain components including windows and doors.
“The advice we have had from [the Heating and Hotwater Industry Council] is to inform your building control of the situation and escalate back to MHCLG the scale of the problem, the disruption and the distress to consumers. This may increase pressure to quickly implement a stay of execution while the review is undertaken.”
The letter says that Ideal Boilers will not be able to develop and approve a new flue using non-combustible materials “for the foreseeable months to come”.
It adds that Ideal Boilers does not believe this measure is necessary and that it would add “unnecessary burden and cost to the industry”.
Asked about the letter, Dr Lancaster told Inside Housing she was “supportive” of the ban but was pointing out “an unintended consequence”.
She added: “Our hope is that an exemption will be made to the regulation of flues in external walls as is the case for other components – or that a formal period of transition will be allowed to provide gas boiler manufacturers adequate time to develop a compliant flue solution.”
A spokesperson for MHCLG said: “While the government has banned combustible materials on new high-rise residential buildings, we have committed to keeping the ban under review.”
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