12 An opportunity intersection


Digitisation is crucial to future of transport, bringing a wealth of energy innovation opportunities, highlights Paul Zanelli.


Whole energy system thinking has led to a focus on how different sectors consume, use and provide opportunities for carbon dioxide reductions.


Just two years ago, the UK transport sector took a hefty 38% slice of the nation’s total final consumption of UK energy products, highlighting a huge opportunity here to reduce dependence on fossil fuels. Importantly, this sector is also on the cusp of a digital revolution, referred to as Intelligent Mobility, that will open up opportunities to do just this. With this in mind, the Transport Systems Catapult is seeking to assist the UK secure more of the high growth Intelligent Mobility market that is forecast to reach £900bn by 2025. Intelligent Mobility is a radical departure from personal ownership of cars to a world where mobility is consumed as a service using increasingly connected and automated vehicles. With an increase in centrally managed vehicle fleets, the opportunity to maximise efficiencies of movement of goods, people and


Building for the future


Tomorrow’s Built Environment will house myriad innovations that demand the latest in power quality management. Professor John Counsell and Dr Matt Stewart explain.


The built environment is responsible for almost half of all carbon emissions from energy use in Europe and UK, making it a prime target for high profile, emissions reduction policy initiatives such as the Energy Performance of Buildings Directive (EPBD).


As part of a smart energy supply system for modern buildings, distributed generation has a key role in reducing demand and emissions at community, district and city levels. Here, a local electricity generation and supply system that also uses the heat by-product, can complement conventional plant such as gas boilers. Alongside energy efficiency measures such as building refurbishment, combined heat and power (CHP) is an increasingly attractive option to locally generate heat and electricity from a single machine.


The very high rated efficiency (~84%) possible of a system featuring a gas fired reciprocating CHP engine assumes full use of heat generated in operation. For a modern building with relatively low heat loss, correct CHP plant sizing should optimise the use of heat generation within the local network during winter months, with top-up from gas boilers as required.


Building integrated photovoltaics are also an attractive option to locally generate zero carbon electricity in isolation or as part of a suite of sustainability measures featuring CHP. PV complements a local CHP system by generating zero carbon electricity at a time of year and time of day when electrical demand from cooling is highest.


This natural diversity of a larger grid network is critical to power quality control in systems containing multiple generating plant. A significant difficulty in design of extended


Fully Integrated Smart Energy System - CHPV


District CHP Plant Heat Store Central Battery


Residential Zones Local Services Controls Building PV Array Embedded Heat Stores


Smart Network Interface Managed Power Quality Managed Emissions Managed Efficiency


Other Generating Plant: Local PV / WInd


Gas Boiler Plant


CHPV System Controller


Absorption Cooling Plant


Commercial Zones Local Services Controls Building PV Array Embedded Batteries


CHP-based systems is that this diversity is not present. As a result, the network’s function and effect on power quality must be emulated by controlling local thermal and electrical energy storage at the single and low three phase levels. In this scenario, the relationship between maintaining a defined network electrical power quality while simultaneously ensuring thermal demands are met is very complex and dynamic. Given this, a whole systems approach is needed to fully understand heat and electrical interactions in fully integrated systems design principles. State of the art controls for these emerging systems achieves the dual targets of managing power quality and optimising energy efficiency at system level only by taking a fresh whole systems approach to design and control. A current InnovateUK and EPSRC funded project with University of Liverpool, Arup, BRE and Peel Utilities - CHPV - is using this approach to generate validated models and design tools for local power quality control. The schematic


Retail / Other Zones Local Services Controls Building PV Array Embedded Heat Stores


vehicle assets is enormous.


Additional opportunities include using more clean fuels, minimising road accidents and congestion, reducing the need for parking spaces in urban environments and delivering cost effective travel tailored to the individual. Given this, it’s easy to see why Intelligent Mobility might be seen as the ‘Opportunity Intersection’.


While the move away from personal car ownership is a difficult concept for many, it is accepted within the automotive industry. Following General Motors’ $500m investment in ride sharing service Lyft, chief executive Mary Batta stated: “Our industry is going to undergo more change in the next 5 years than it has in the last 50 [years]”. Meanwhile, Tesla alone has sold more than 2500 electric cars in the UK this year so far. The Tesla app will synchronise with your alarm call to, for example, open your garage door, park your car outside, heat the vehicle to your comfort level and plot your journey showing available charging points.


Reflecting these developments, the Transport Systems Catapult is focusing on three key drivers; a move away from personal ownership


towards mobility as a service, increasingly connected and automated transport, and increasingly personalised and tailored transport. These trends go hand in hand with increasing electrical vehicles, fleet ownership providing high asset utilisation and greater opportunities for energy management efficiencies.


Road transport aside, the marine segment is reducing environmental impacts by, for example, using shore-to-ship power tethers when in port, to reduce diesel generator use. This shift towards electricity from shore assumes the power is produced by clean energy resources. Additional innovations include the use of Liquid Natural Gas and Small Modular Reactors - small nuclear reactors - on merchant ships. Meanwhile, the rail segment is moving at high speed towards further electrification, with for example, mobile electrical storage for train to grid support. And in aviation, the Transport Catapult is looking at many energy-related innovations including traffic control staking. Here vast fuel savings can be made following a reduction in runway congestion.


Paul Zanelli is Chief Technology Officer at the Transport Systems Catapult.


summarises the project scope and incorporates likely features in present and future smart energy systems with fully integrated CHP and PV to balance seasonal variations in generation at local building and cluster levels.


Full deployment of the benefits of locally managed systems and configurations needs information from smart metering, reporting of energy flows and data management. Evolution of these systems also implies a need for optimised design of local 11kV Private Wire Networks and smart integration with the DNO supply. A whole systems approach incorporating distributed generation and control can realise emissions reductions and power quality management in the built environment sector.


Professor John Counsell is from Electronic and Electrical Engineering at the University of Chester and is Managing Director of Advanced Control Partnerships. Dr Matt Stewart is from the University of Liverpool.


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