The British Pump Manufacturers Association (BPMA) reckons that more than 100,000 non-compliant pumps are being sold in the UK every year.
Non-compliant pumps being manufactured to look like genuine OEM pumps, even sometimes equipped with bogus CE markings that some says stand for China Export rather than Conformit茅 Europ茅enne.
Lee Tebbatt, managing director at Wilo UK and incoming vice president of the BPMA, said: 鈥淲e鈥檙e seeing pumps that are illegal in terms of their energy efficiency being disguised with fake CE markings. The installer won鈥檛 know that they are buying a fake pump over the counter and the consumer won鈥檛 know that it鈥檚 being fitted.鈥�
He added: 鈥淭he stand-alone market, where a non-condensing boiler is being used with a hot water cylinder and header tank, is the target for non-compliant pumps. Typically, this market is circa one million units per year.鈥�
BPMA chief executive Steve Schofield said: 鈥淲e estimate that circa 10% of the one million central heating pumps, technically known as circulators, being brought into the UK are non-compliant. It is a swarm; it is blatant and it is now over-the-counter. Once fitted, they are costing consumers hundreds of pounds every year on their heating bills, and it is seriously impacting the UK鈥檚 ability to meet its net zero obligations.鈥�
The situation has deteriorated since April 2022 when the global microchip supply crisis was at its height, according to Mr Schofield. 鈥淭he imported pumps use old-style AC motors that are less than half the price of permanent magnet motors equipped with microchips to vary the speed of the pump to reduce energy consumption. The non-compliant three-speed pumps use circa 100 watts of energy compared to 30 watts for the permanent magnet design.鈥�
The UK government estimates that, based on 2021 energy prices, minimum energy performance standards from compliant pumps provide annual savings of 拢75 and greenhouse gas emissions savings of eight million tonnes of CO2 equivalent (MtCO2e). This saving is now likely to be much higher due to recent increases in energy prices.
Mr Schofield said that supply restrictions encouraged wholesalers to source non-compliant products. 鈥淪upply chain issues, specifically problems with microchips, has brought the problem into the mainstream heating product distribution channels, with Far Eastern exporters taking advantage of high levels of demand and insufficient supply.
鈥淲e have been very lax in the UK in terms of policing the market and eradicating non-compliant pumps. Continental European countries have much stricter regulatory policing regimes and are not being targeted in the same way.鈥�
He concluded: 鈥淚t is the legal responsibility of the importer to ensure that only compliant pumps are brought into the UK. However, legal responsibility does not stop there. It is the distributor鈥檚 responsibility to only sell CE marked pumps and it is the installer鈥檚 responsibility to ensure that what they are fitting is compliant. We need the government to step in, empower the market surveillance authorities and clampdown to protect consumers and its own climate change targets.鈥�
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