SAP 10.2 Table 4c(3) (PDF p.169) "Factor for controls and charging method"
multiplies a heat network's heat requirement by 1.05-1.10 for FLAT-RATE
charging (note d: household pays a fixed amount regardless of heat used, so
no incentive to economise), and by 1.0 for charging linked to use. The
worksheet folds it into the heat-network requirement alongside the Table 12c
distribution loss factor:
(307) space = (98c) x (302) x (305) x (306)
(310) DHW = (64) x (305a) x (306)
Our cascade applied (306) DLF but never (305)/(305a), so every flat-rate
community-heating cert under-counted demand -> over-rated SAP.
Folded the factor into the 1/DLF efficiency override at the space-heating
(206) and DHW (water-inherits-from-main) sites. Space column adds +0.05 for
no thermostatic control (2301/2302); DHW column is 1.05 flat-rate / 1.0
linked-to-use.
Corpus (RdSAP-21.0.1, 1000 certs): community cluster median +0.32 -> -0.19,
within-0.5 38% -> 62% (control 2307 +0.83 -> -0.19; 2306 unchanged at factor
1.0 as spec requires). Overall gauge 65.0% -> 65.9%, MAE 1.174 -> 1.160.
Ratcheted the corpus-test floor 0.62 -> 0.63 / MAE ceiling 1.25 -> 1.22.
Also records (corpus-test comment + scripts/decompose_co2_pe_error.py) the
disproof of the prior "CO2/PE +5% is a factor/scope bug" lead: factors are
spec-exact, scope identical, and the bias is per-cert demand fidelity
(corr(SAP-err, PE-diff) = -0.54), not a one-slice factor fix.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.8 <noreply@anthropic.com>
