INDUSTRY NEWS £4.7 MILLION ENERGY UPGRADE FOR HEREFORD COUNTY HOSPITAL
Wye Valley NHS Trust has taken a significant step to lower its carbon footprint as part of a £4.7 million energy upgrade at the Hereford County Hospital site, which is due to be completed this year. The funding comes as part of a wider national decarbonisation plan supported by a grant scheme from The Department for Business Energy & Industrial Strategy (BEIS), delivered by Salix Finance, which helps the public sector work towards their net zero goals. Centrica Business Solutions will deliver the
multi-million pound upgrade to provide greener energy and efficiency to Hereford County Hospital and six of the older buildings on the site, including the Education and Development Centre, Post Graduate Medical Centre, Longfield House staff accommodation and Lionel Green building. Work has already started with the installation
of 3,170 low energy lights in the main hospital building. This will be followed by more than 300
rooftop solar panels, which will provide enough energy to power the equivalent of 27 UK homes per year. Modern switching mechanisms, 1,163 pipework insulation jackets and 263 metres of pipework lagging, to reduce heat loss, are also being installed in the buildings across the site. A ground source heat pump network –
which involves drilling 47 boreholes 200m into the ground – is also now being installed at locations around the hospital grounds. Nearly six miles long in total, this will pump water, naturally warmed by the earth, and convert it into usable heat for six of the buildings on the site. Alan Dawson, director of Strategy and Planning at
Wye Valley NHS Trust, said: “We’re very pleased to receive this grant to enable us to undertake this exciting and significant move forward to help
CONTRACT ENABLES RENEWABLE ENERGY SUPPLIER TO SUPPORT VULNERABLE CUSTOMERS
Sigma Connected has won a Pure Planet contract to support a 100% renewable energy supplier in managing its most vulnerable or financially challenged customers through ground-breaking new service, Reach:Out. This initiative helps customers who are struggling to pay bills to access grants and free money advice, as well as signposting to charities who can help with their wellbeing. Reach:Out also helps customers understand how their utility suppliers can help with water or fuel poverty, as research shows low awareness of this type of support. The two-year contract award follows a successful four-week pilot of
Reach:Out between the two companies, which saw 23% positive engagement from those referred over eight working days. Customers were guided back to Pure Planet so they could work together on a resolution to their debt, as well as connecting with charities such as the Samaritans, StepChange and MIND. Gary Gilburd, CEO of Sigma Connected, said: “Our Reach:Out team was set up
to provide a new solution to support and guide customers who are struggling to pay their bills... Our initial pilot with the team at Pure Planet has been a huge success and has helped a large number of previously unreachable members, so we’re delighted to be taking the next more permanent steps.”
www.sigmaconnected.co.uk
COMMENT
However, the nights are drawing in and it won’t be long before the heating will be switched on – and
W
this is going to be a huge worry for many. Recent reports have highlighted the fact that energy bills are going to rise considerable this Winter, putting more vulnerable customers at risk of fuel poverty. But with energy costs rising, so is energy
consumption. According to Nico van der Merwe, VP Home and Distribution UK&I, Schneider Electric: “Over the next decade, our homes are set to become the biggest consumers of electricity thanks to the electrification of heat and the move to electric vehicles.” The move to digital technology is key here, as Nico explains: “With
domestic energy consumption expected to double in the coming years, it will be more important than ever that people can easily manage the efficiency of their homes, including energy consumption, production and storage. This is only possible through connected digital technology.” Visit
https://www.se.com/uk/en/ for more information.
Rachael Morling - Editor 4 ENERGY MANAGEMENT - Autumn 2021
elcome to the Autumn issue of Energy Management. It’s mid September now and it’s currently a rather lovely 21˚C outside.
reduce our carbon footprint and improve our environmental sustainability. We have already taken a number of steps to reduce our carbon footprint at our community hospitals and this builds upon that progress.”
www.centricabusinesssolutions.com
ENERGY SECTOR NEEDS ‘RADICAL TRANSFORMATION TO REACH NET ZERO’
Arcadis has published ‘Supercharging Net Zero’, a research report examining how the international energy sector can lead the way to achieving net zero greenhouse emissions. The report confirms that, if the global energy sector fails to rapidly decarbonise and increase its generation capacity, the world will lose the race to net zero. This report uses economic modelling
www.reachout.co.uk
to simulate the conditions necessary for the global energy sector to rapidly shift from fossil fuels to renewable power generation. It focuses on how ten key geographical markets would need to contribute to a global energy transition, drawing out takeaways that can support in guiding the transition to renewable energy and decarbonise with a heightened sense of urgency. It confirms that now is the time to act. Tim Cooper, UK client development
director for Water, Energy and Environment at Arcadis, said: “For the world to reach net-zero, we need a huge increase in investment in both renewable energy technologies, such as solar, onshore and offshore wind, and hydro power, as well as negative emissions technologies like carbon capture and storage. €6 trillion globally is a massive number and will require funding on a scale that neither corporations nor governments can achieve by themselves. But by bringing in blended public and private financing, and innovative new technologies, it’s not impossible – and those who invest early are likely to see the greatest benefits.”
NEWS IN BRIEF
A new report by EIT InnoEnergy reveals that its portfolio of 250+ innovative start-ups and scale-ups is set to save 1.1 gigatonnes of CO2e – equivalent to one-third of Europe’s 2030 carbon emissions reduction target – and €9.1 billion in annual energy costs by the end of the decade, spearheading the way to a decarbonised Europe. The full report can be found on the website.
www.innoenergy.com
Biogas producer, Adapt Biogas, is said to be the first company in the UK to generate its own onsite heat and electricity using liquefied natural gas (LNG) from Flogas. Feeding two combined heat and power (CHP) engines, this provides electricity to power the company’s biogas-to-grid injection system, as well as heat to kickstart its biogas production cycle.
www.adaptbiogas.com
www.flogas.co.uk/business
SSE Energy Solutions and National Grid have unveiled a new project that could decarbonise heat networks, capturing waste heat from electricity transformers to generate hot water and space heating for homes and businesses. It is estimated that the heat recovery project will initially reduce heat network carbon emissions by more than 40% versus traditional gas-led systems. Critically, the technology offers a route to net-zero heat when applied to transformers served by 100% renewable electricity from wind or solar farms. The project has the potential to
www.arcadis.com
save millions of tonnes of CO2 every year if rolled out across National Grid’s network of transformers across England and Wales, harnessing this waste heat via SSE heat networks to serve towns and cities across the region.
www.sse.com
www.energymanagementmag.co.uk
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36
