Commercial heating
www.heatingandventilating.net
Left: Ian Allan, Head of R&D at Switch2 Energy
Heat networks perform for cost & carbon savings
Heat network owners and operators must take a data-driven, strategic approach to operations and maintenance to tackle poor efficiency on communal heat schemes, says Ian Allan, head of market strategy for Switch2 Energy
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any of the UK’s existing 17,500 heat networks are operating at low efficiency levels of only 35 to 45% – resulting in
poor cost and carbon performance. That’s in stark contrast to the best performing legacy schemes, which can reach 65% efficiency. The good news is that there’s great potential to
raise efficiency, improve reliability and cut costs and carbon emissions. This can be achieved by taking a strategic approach to operations and maintenance. Raising efficiency is the most effective way to tackle three key challenges of: reducing rising energy and operational costs; cutting carbon emissions, and complying with new regulations. 1. Reduce costs The current energy crisis means that investing in heat network maintenance and efficiency improvements can deliver much bigger and faster cost reduction than before, thus helping to improve affordability for residents and reduce the risk of fuel poverty. At current gas prices of 15p per kWh, a typical 300-unit apartment building could save more than £4,000 per year on fuel costs if efficiency improved by just 1%.
By using a heat network O&M specialist, such as
Switch2, to take a data-driven approach to O&M, a network of this size could reduce costs by between £90,000 and 160,000 annually through efficiency improvements.
10 March 2023
decarbonisation further and prepare for major expansion of the communal heating sector – to supply 18% of homes by 2050. Communal heat suppliers must also be
ready to comply with major regulation and new technical standards, which require a much better efficiency and environmental performance, as well as improved customer service and reliability standards.
Four ways to better heat network performance
Our clients pay the same for this specialist, data-
informed O&M service as they would for a standard service – provided by a traditional gas engineer. The savings, both monetary and carbon, soon add up and deliver rapid investment payback. 2. Reduce carbon and gain compliance Wasting less energy via improved efficiency has the double benefit of decreasing carbon emissions, as well as costs. It is critical that existing heat networks are fully optimised and operating at low temperatures and maximum efficiencies in readiness for reaching Net Zero by 2050. These standards are essential to replacing gas boilers and combined heat and power systems with lower and zero carbon technologies, such as heat pumps. In this way, the sector will advance
Many heat networks underperform because data intelligence is lacking and issues are hidden until they become problems. Maintenance tends to be reactive and piecemeal with no consideration for the overall efficiency of the heating system. By contrast, high performing communal heating systems take a holistic and strategic approach to O&M. The essentials of a progressive O&M strategy are: 1. Use data intelligence to inform and drive targeted, proactive maintenance. Capture data from meters, BEMS, HIUs etc and use remote monitoring to understand the performance of entire network – from plant room to properties. Accessible data is centralised, rather than sitting in silos. 2. Appoint one single specialist heat network O&M contractor who has an expert overview of entire
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