heating

Compared to pre-industrial times, average land temperatures have risen about 1.2 °C. By 2052, global temperatures will likely exceed pre-industrial levels by 1.5 °C. The Met Office is warning that heat waves will become more frequent and more intense, predicting prolonged heat waves every other year from 2050 onwards, with temperatures exceeding 40 °C. How will the UK housing stock fare in all this? Not well, as two major 2021 studies have shown.

The heat pump revolution is underway in the UK with more and more housebuilders and social housing providers opting for heat pumps rather than the traditional fossil fuelled gas and oil fuelled boilers. The Government has introduced legislation that will see boilers phased out by 2025 in new build properties, but sensibly, many developers are getting ahead of the game and future proofing their new homes and in many cases the heating system upgrades on existing homes as well. The new, easy to install, highly energy efficient air to water heat pumps available now are proving to be hugely popular, with Unitherm already picking up a number of sizeable contracts from social housing providers. And it’s been Unitherm’s ‘All U Need’ approach - full supply, design heat pump package, with a simple to install system and full technical support that is proving popular.

The UK Government has identified that heat networks have an important part to play in the provision of low carbon heating. This is supported by government grant schemes like the Heat Network Delivery Unit (HNDU), the Heat Network Efficiency Scheme (HNES) and the Green Heat Network Fund (GHNF). There is also a separate scheme in Scotland providing £300m of funding for heat networks.

Last year’s Heat and Buildings Strategy set out the UK’s route to net zero, when it comes to our buildings, and decarbonising buildings is one of the topics in the spotlight in the elemental content theatres at this year’s InstallerSHOW – including a keynote delivered by Business & Energy Minister Lord Callanan to open the event on 21st June.

Following on from the opening speech, visitors can listen to expert speakers in the free-to-attend theatres addressing issues including large-scale social housing retrofit, local renewable energy generation, the Future Homes Standard and much more.

Richard Bishop, Head of Marketing for UK and Ireland at Panasonic Heating & Cooling Solutions, calls for social housing providers to tackle fuel poverty by collaborating to deliver more sustainable energy solutions for the homes of the future.

Recent research from the Home Builders Federation (HBF) highlighted that people moving house are increasingly looking for homes that are energy efficient, giving them more certainty over fuel bills and affordability. This focus on the energy performance of our homes comes as Building Regs are updated and the industry prepares for the Future Homes Standard in 2025.

The expert speakers in the free-to-attend elemental content theatres – taking place alongside InstallerSHOW at the NEC in June – will be addressing these issues and more, shining a light on the route to net zero for built environment professionals.

The impact of increasing global gas and electricity prices has already plunged hundreds of thousands more UK families into fuel poverty.

Estimates suggest the current average fuel poverty gap of £233 per home* could more than double in the coming year.  As a result, fuel poverty has arguably never been higher on the agenda for registered providers.  

Unfortunately residents connected to communal heat networks will not be immune, as their monthly (and pre-payment) heat bills are typically tied directly to gas prices.

So, faced with an almost perfect storm; and against a backdrop of traditionally poorly performing communal heat networks – how can the performance of existing installations be improved to both urgently reduce tenant energy costs and prepare them for the transition to low carbon heat?