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A good time to go green
With the decarbonisation of the UK’s domestic heating a governmental priority, a well-designed district heating scheme could play a crucial role in cutting carbon emissions. Pete Mills, technical operations manager at Bosch Commercial and Industrial, looks at the role of renewables and low carbon heat sources in heat networks
change commitments and carbon targets. The UK emits 496 million tonnes of carbon dioxide (CO2) into the atmosphere per year, with residential properties accounting for 26% of these carbon emissions. As such, there is considerable scope for the government and housing developers to fund and design district heating schemes that play their part in the decarbonisation of domestic heat. The recent announcement from the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) confirmed that it would invest £320 million of public funds to support the development of heat networks. This investment is a bold step forward for the district heating industry and for the decarbonisation of our economy.
A Role of renewables
While district heating schemes are renowned for improving energy savings and reducing fuel poverty amongst housing associations and their tenants, they can also greatly reduce the CO2 footprint of the UK’s housing stock. Unlike small-scale urban developments,
the large-scale nature of heat networks allows for the incorporation of renewable, low carbon heat sources in a way that would be impractical or too costly if approached on an individual property basis. By incorporating the likes of solar thermal and CHP alongside a condensing boiler, district heating schemes can play their part in helping the UK to achieve the Government’s emissions targets of a 57% CO2 reduction by 2030 on 1990 levels.
January 2019
ccording to the Committee on Climate Change, the UK government is likely to fall short of its climate
The examples of large district heating schemes we have in the UK using renewable energy, show that such schemes require a great deal of planning and cooperation to make them successful. For smaller schemes, this extra effort required can mean that renewables get placed into the ‘too difficult to do’ pile, unless there is significant incentive to do them. This is a pity as there is a case to be made for one such renewable technology. Many smaller networks of 200 dwellings or less would benefit from the inclusion of renewable technology. This is all too often the realm of gas boilers only, but solar thermal panels provide a valuable alternative. By employing solar thermal technology to work concurrently with a condensing boiler, the buildings’ overall carbon footprint could be significantly reduced with heat captured from the sun being supplied to the properties. When temperatures dip during the winter months, a fossil-fuel powered peak load boiler is capable of delivering the required heat that the renewables are unable to supply, meeting the buildings full load. Despite relying upon fossil fuels, condensing boilers are highly efficient with low emissions making them the perfect partner for a renewable heat source.
Efficiency up, costs down
The incorporation of renewable technologies into the design process of a district heating scheme has the added benefit of reducing the energy bills of the end-users. With renewable and more efficient technologies in place, building operators and landlords can reduce the cost of the fuel that they are consuming, to
A typical district heating scheme
Pete Mills, technical operations manager at Bosch Commercial and Industrial
the benefit of tenants. For instance, solar thermal is a durable technology that can operate for many years, providing truly renewable energy for large parts of the year. It currently still attracts RHI payments, which make it a cost-effective heat source for a district heating scheme. Experience has shown that where just a building’s roof area is used for solar collector fields, yields of around 6% of the heat coverage can be expected. The cost of the end-user’s energy bills is all too often an overlooked part of the district heating design process. However, it is important from the outset to ensure that residents’ energy will be priced at least parallel to – and ideally lower than – other utilities. By adopting a user-first design philosophy, designers can see that the inclusion of renewable sources is the only way of ensuring that customers can benefit from reduced fuel bills. BEIS’s £320 million funding announcement for district heating
District heating design best practice
schemes is a small part of a much wider picture in the UK government’s own bid to drive-down carbon emissions. Fundamentally,
renewable
technologies are not just beneficial to the
environment; their inclusion in any district heating scheme will help to alleviate fuel poverty by
reducing energy bills for end- users. With around eight million
people predicted to receive their heat from a heat network by 2030, now is as good a time as any to ‘go green’.
www.heatingandventilating.net
www.heatingandventilating.net
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