New Government funding totalling £24 million to help develop clean and efficient heating systems has been awarded to 13 local authorities across England.
This is the first round of funding from a £320 million pot set aside to support heat networks, which have been dubbed ‘central heating for cities’ and have the potential to reduce heating costs in some cases by more than 30%.
The networks remove the need for individual properties to have their own boilers by linking them to a single heat source.
Heat networks use technologies such as biomass boilers, heat pumps, energy from waste, combined heat and power (CHP) plants and even heat from deep below the earth’s crust. They can also use recycled waste heat from places like factories, power stations and even the London Underground and pump it into homes and businesses to keep them warm.
The scheme will run over five years and is expected to enable up to 200 heat networks to be built, while leveraging around £2 billion of wider public and private investment.
Heat networks have already been used successfully in the UK, and are popular across Scandinavian cities for keeping homes warm in winter – such as the system installed in Oslo by Glasgow-based Star Renewable Energy
English Climate Change and Industry Minister Nick Hurd, MP, said: “Energy innovations like heat networks can cut costs for households and reduce carbon emissions, as almost half of the energy we use goes towards heating our homes and buildings.”
See also:
‘If Norway and England can use Glasgow-built heat pumps to keep warm, why can’t we?’ asks Star Renewable Energy
Pixie Energy is an incubator and a facilitator of strategic research and project work, focusing on energy regulation, policy and markets at the local and national level. Find out more about Pixie Energy