FEEDBACK Could updated night-storage heaters be the future of residential heating? allow those British nationals to apply for residency in the UK. Many building services engineers in Hong Kong are also Chartered Engineers in the UK, so are immediately qualified to work here. Engineering standards in the UK and Hong Kong also bear a strong resemblance. If the UK fails to offer such visas to talented engineers from Hong Kong, they may choose to migrate elsewhere. Sam Fan MCIBSE CIBSE LinkedIn Building Simulation Group discusses frozen geometry Was there ever a subject more likely to set an engineer s keyboard aflame than frozen geometry. When geometry does settle down, are you still wrestling with room data in several disparate sources? Room names in your schedules, in your MEP Revit, in the thermal model, and a fully renumbered architectural scheme? How do you reconcile this problem? Chris Yates Residential heating goes back to the future and a potential solution to the skills gap Heat electric Join the conversation We want to hear from you. Talk to us. @CIBSEJournal CIBSE LinkedIn www.cibse.org Subscribe to our newsletter Receive our top stories about building services engineering. Sign up at cibsejournal.com I would like to propose the future of residential heating: night storage heaters, plus decent home insulation and (night-time) immersion-heated tanks for hot water. Idont mean the awful 1970s versions; I mean units with excellent insulation, digital thermostat control and crucially smartphone-app control. The storage heaters would charge up overnight or whenever we have excess low carbon electricity, but the insulation and smartphone app would give the resident temperature and time control for each room. This would get homes off gas (saving the standing charge), give far better control than thermostatic radiator valves, and shift the load to off-peak times all for a much smaller capital cost than a switch to a heat pump. Id also like to suggest that electric cars be renamed house batteries with wheels. Cars are only driven, on average, for one hour a day, so for 96% of the time they are plugged in, acting as batteries. Rather than being an extra load on the grid, they offer the flexibility itneeds to increase the percentage of renewables. Matt Gitsham Principal energy consultant sustainability, buildings and places, Aecom Hong Kong could close Brexit skills gap Before the handover of Hong Kong, the British Nationality Selection Scheme (BNSS) was established to allow talented Hong Kong citizens to apply for full British citizenship. However, British National (Overseas) passport holders born in the 1970s, 80s and 90s are unable to benefit from the BNSS, as it ended in 1997. There may be a dearth of engineers in the UK after Brexit, so the government should resume the BNSS to Indeed, Chris. An agreed protocol for room naming (maybe a centralised schedule or register) should be set up at project inception, to which all parties in the design team must adhere. If any changes are required, it would have to be carried out via a formal change request. Nzube Igwume MCIBSE Some immutable reference a design ID like the primary key of records in a database table would be the simplest approach, although there may be other, more meta data approaches. Chris Yates With BIM it should be getting better, as the premise is that data exists in one place. There are also standards that cover this. ISO 4157-2 covers Room Naming and Numbering. If this was quoted in an Employer s Information Requirements (EIRs) or BIM Execution Plan, this problem should go away. Online databases are useful and there is software that can take care of this. Carl Collins My experience is that data does not exist in one place. Revit has Rooms for architects and Spaces for engineers. Engineering calculations can be in a spreadsheet, a thermal model or on paper. Lighting consultants may prefer to use Dialux and there are a host of acoustic applications. ISO 4157-2 could be better, but at least it s a standard. Like you say, room numbering deserves attention in the EIRs. Chris Yates CIBSE Journal welcomes readers letters, opinions, news stories, events listings, and proposals for articles. Please send all material for possible publication to: editor@cibsejournal.com or write to: Alex Smith, editor, CIBSE Journal, CPL, 1 Cambridge Technopark, Newmarket Road, Cambridge CB5 8PB, UK. We reserve the right to edit all letters. 16 April 2019 www.cibsejournal.com CIBSE Apr19 pp16 Letters.indd 16 22/03/2019 16:47