01.12.2020, 13:20

Regional GSHP Project Recognised with Global Award

Together Housing and Kensa Contracting have received international acclaim for a ground source heat pump retrofit programme involving 770 homes in the North of England.

A sub-category of the annual European Heat Pump Awards (EHPA), the Heat Pump City of the Year (HPCY) award commends local regions which have put in place large scale exemplary energy-efficient heat pump projects. Together Housing and Kensa Contracting’s continuing programme of retrofit ground source heat pump installations, which has increased comfort levels and lowered heating costs for hundreds of residents across multiple sites in Yorkshire and Lancashire, fought off competition from projects in 110 cities across 27 countries around the world to take the title.

The government of the United Kingdom recently set out aspirations for 600,000 electrically-powered heat pumps per year to be installed into homes by 2028, as part of a 10-point plan for a ‘green industrial revolution’. This recent award win demonstrates that the UK is already leading the way on the European stage in reducing carbon emissions to meet its 2050 net-zero target, and is committed to tackling climate change ahead of the COP26 summit, which is being hosted in Glasgow in November 2021.

Cutting carbon emissions and confronting fuel poverty

Following a successful pilot scheme in 2018, Kensa Contracting and Together Housing have been on a mission to tackle fuel poverty and reduce the carbon footprint of the social landlord’s existing housing stock. By replacing a mixture of old gas boilers and inefficient electric storage heaters with Kensa’s highly efficient and low carbon ground source heat pumps over the last three years, more than 700 households have seen savings of up to 45% on their heating and hot water bills.

A tenant fed back: “The new heating system is amazing; before it was so difficult to heat up more than one room in my home, but now I don’t have to worry about that.”

Using the current SAP methodology, the lifetime carbon savings have been calculated as 44,858tCO2. As the grid further decarbonises with the increased levels of renewable capacity, the carbon impact of heating will be further reduced.

The scheme was procured using the ProcurePlus framework, the first domestic ground source heat pump replacement program procured via a framework in this way. Together Housing has made a significant commitment to renewable heat they are leading the way in rolling out large scale deployment of renewable heat technology.

Patrick Berry, Together Energy Services managing director, comments: “We are delighted to receive this award from the European Heat Pump Association. This has been Together Housing’s first major commitment to heat pump technology and it will make a great difference to our tenants’ carbon impact. The project paves the way for a much wider application of heat pumps as we move away from fossil fuels in our properties.”

David Broom, Kensa Contracting commercial director, adds: “Kensa Contracting has pioneered the use of ground source heat pumps in social housing, developing the capability to deliver increasingly ambitious market-leading projects; our work with Together Housing is the largest of its kind delivered to date. This scheme has been a true partnership of client and contractor working to achieve a shared goal of decarbonisation, reducing fuel poverty and providing affordable comfortable homes, through the adoption of British-manufactured renewable technology.”

Shared ground loop array infrastructure provides a blueprint

After the incumbent heating systems have been decommissioned in each individual property, they are replaced by a quiet and highly efficient Kensa Shoebox ground source heat pump. The Shoebox heat pumps are then linked to arrays of shared ground loop boreholes drilled under the green spaces and car parks adjacent to the tower blocks. The system design is very efficient, as the energy collected from the underlying rock is distributed at an ambient temperature to the individual heat pumps, which then upgrade this to a higher temperature at the point of use and only when required.

This is an alternative system architecture to traditional district heating, where heat is generated in a central plant and then continually circulated through the system, which leads to significant heat losses and potential overheating in risers and communal areas. The use of distributed heat pumps also removes the need for a plant room, complex metering and billing arrangements, and restrictive energy supplier contracts, mimicking traditional gas network infrastructure.

Ground source heat pump technology is vastly underused within the UK, despite the system efficiencies being some of the best of any other heating technology available, offering the lowest carbon output and running costs. Shared ground loop array schemes are eligible for government funding, and Kensa believes that this accessible and innovative system architecture is the key to increasing the national deployment of the technology.