HEATING SYSTEMS ENERGY EFFICIENCY
house you would save even more money instead of sending it back to the grid for just 3p [the export tariff ].’ Landy urged contractors to look at how
this could be done. He added that solar had, generally, been a success in hot water applications, but there were still serious installation problems. ‘The controls are critical because too often
systems have been found working back to front so the panels release heat into the atmosphere,’ he said. ‘Commissioning and integration are vital. We have to look at these things in terms of whether they will still be working in 15 or 20 years’ time.’ He said a combination of waste heat recycling and continuously running renewables would be a better option than ‘banging on the gas for a short period to get the building up to temperature’. Conference chairman David Frise, head of
The government’s cutback in the Renewable Heat Incentive for large-scale biomass is seen by some as a major setback for its development
‘Thermal storage using ice or phase-
change materials is a good application for renewables that often provides energy when you don’t need it,’ he said. ‘This way you could store the energy for release into the building at the right time.’ Mike Landy of the Renewable Energy
Association (REA) also pointed out that photovoltaic (PV) panels produce electricity in the middle of the day when people are not, generally, at home. ‘You get your FiT payments, but if you could also use that electricity to heat the
Embodied carbon Data lacking for heating systems He said the embodied
There is a growing demand for more to be done about embodied carbon. Currently, it is languishing in the ‘too difficult’ box, according to David Frise of the HVCA, who argued that there were massive improvements to be made during the manufacturing and construction phases of buildings and products that could dwarf all efforts to cut carbon during operational lifetimes. Craig Jones from Sustain
said it would become an even more important element of lifecycle assessments as the energy supply is decarbonised.
32 CIBSE Journal February 2012
carbon in a new-build house is 500 kg of CO2 per sq m, which is equal to about 13 years of operation. For a typical office, it is 800 to 1,000 kg per sq m, which is about 20% to 35% of ‘whole life carbon’ impact. ‘If electricity is decarbonised, embodied carbon would become 50% more significant for a typical office – about 30 to 50% of whole life impact,’ said Jones. The Department of Energy and Climate Change is aiming for the entire UK electricity supply to be 95% lower carbon by 2050, which would make the carbon emitted
during the construction phase of a building far more significant as very little would be created during operation. Jones said there was very
little embodied carbon data available for heating systems, but that could change significantly with the imminent publication of a series of standards recommended by the working party CEN TC350. These will increase pressure for businesses to make more environmental product declarations (EPDs), which require manufacturers to state the embodied carbon of their products.
sustainability at the Heating and Ventilation Contractors Association, pointed out that contractors held the key because they were charged with integrating new technologies into old buildings. He said that the HVCA had developed an ‘integrators’ guide’ in partnership with CIBSE, research body BSRIA and the Building Controls Industry Association, which is due to be published this year. ‘Clients are now buying the performance,
not the products,’ said Frise. ‘The Green Deal is putting this into a financial context. If we don’t deliver the performance, the clients pick up the tab. Contractors are now in charge of the promise of carbon savings, but integration is the critical factor.’ He predicted an increasing role for
district heating, but felt the 60% cut to the Renewable Heat Incentive (RHI) for large- scale biomass could be a big setback. However, Simon Woodward from the UK
District Energy Association said the new one penny tariff for large biomass boiler plant was a ‘disincentive’ to investment in this type of renewable scheme, but said it would create more interest in CHP. ‘The original RHI price [for biomass] was too high, but now it is too low.’ He stressed, however, that subsidies
should not be a reason for investing in a scheme. ‘The government will continue to dabble, so your core business model needs to be robust. Green funding should just be cream on top.’ He advised that district heating was not suitable for low-rise housing because at least 30% of the heat is lost, but was ideal for dense urban areas. He said system
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