With the government and planners keen for developers to look at district heating for communal housing schemes, the technology is on the up and up. But size matters with heat networks and are some schemes too small to reap the benefi ts? Andrew Brister reports
istrict heating is having something of a renaissance. The technology – where heat is supplied from a central
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source directly to homes and businesses through a network of pipes carrying hot water – even has a sexy new moniker: heat networks. While the approach has been around for a long while, both in mainland Europe and in the UK, where it came to prominence in the post-war housing boom – it is enjoying a new lease of life in cities up and down the country. The coalition sees the potential for
district heating (DH) to be a cost-effective and viable alternative to individual renewable technologies. In the battle to cut
carbon, while reducing the cost of energy for consumers, the coalition wants to increase take-up; currently, DH provides less than two per cent of the UK’s heat demand. A study commissioned by the Department of Energy & Climate Change (DECC) showed that nearly 50% of heat demand was concentrated with enough density to make heat networks worth investigating, and argued that they could supply up to 14% of the UK’s heat demand. DECC is driving the agenda by establishing a Heat Networks Delivery Unit (HNDU) that will work closely with individual authorities’ project teams in England and Wales. This provides funding to contribute to local authorities’ costs in carrying out early-stage heat network development, and work is under way in cities including Nottingham, Newcastle, Manchester, Sheffi eld and Birmingham. ‘There is a huge opportunity for district
heating in this country,’ points out Phil Jones, chair of CIBSE’s CHP and DH Group, ‘but it has to be in the right place
52 CIBSE Journal February 2014
www.cibsejournal.com
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