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Author Archives: Admin
Boris on energy, marmite and marmalade
August 2014: The Mayor provided the following insight in his latest #AskBoris Twitter session.
I quite liked this – and so did several others it seems – with the issue picked up in the Telegraph, Fox News,and Evening Standard.
Lewisham Free Home Energy Makeover
August 2014: Lewisham Council is looking for “a home we can use to showcase energy efficiency measures. We will install improvements worth up to £10,000 free of charge to make your home less energy hungry. This might be insulation for your walls, roof, doors or windows; more efficient lighting or heating or even renewable energy installed so you can generate your own energy. You’ll get a free assessment of your home to help you decide which measures you want installed.”
The deadline for entries is 31 August 2014.
Posted in Energy Efficiency, News
Tagged Bexley, Bromley, Energy Efficiency, insulation, Lewisham, Retrofit
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London identifies need for £148 billion energy infrastructure
August 2014: A major consultation has been issued by the May0r setting out the capital’s infrastructure challenges over the period to 2050.
The press release states that amongst the many needs London will face over the coming decades: “Demand on energy supplies is set to increase by 20 per cent during a period where demand on electricity supplies is forecast to more than double.”
The Mayor is to establish a new London Infrastructure Delivery Board which, amongst other issues, will consider:
“With energy demands at risk of outstripping supply and key developments such as those at Nine Elms at risk of delay as a result, the Mayor argues a strong long term plan to use energy more efficiently and bring in new capacity where we can is vital. A short term investment of £210m on electricity substations is required but in the long term changes to the regulatory regime must be considered as well as plans to supply a quarter of London’s energy from local sources and exploit the capital’s waste heat resource.
The consultation paper goes on to highlight that:
- London may be facing an energy crisis in the very near future, as demand begins to outstrip supply
- More local energy production will be needed to provide greater resilience
- Local energy production will also help to reduce the national investment requirement and keep energy costs down for consumers
- The GLA will ensure that further large-scale local projects to generate energy locally continue, by working with TfL (the capital’s largest energy consumer)
- 40 per cent of London’s substations are already under stress; and that
- the GLA will be working with UK Power Networks, developers, the London boroughs, Ofgem and the Government to ensure necessary regulatory changes are enacted to maintain London’s energy supply.
Table 1 (page 70) of the consultation paper provides an estimate that an incredible £148 billion of capital expenditure is required on energy infrastructure in London by 2050. The energy estimate assumes over 50 per cent of London’s energy is produced locally by 2050.
A major Arup study accompanies the consultation, ‘The cost of London’s long-term infrastructure‘, and provides much more detail around the two modelling scenarios (‘hybrid’ and ‘centralised’) undertaken – which are based around DECC’s 2050 Pathways calculator – to reach the £148bn cost estimate.
A further report – ‘Enabling Infrastructure: Green, Energy, Water and Waste Infrastructure to 2050‘ – provides a summary of priorities to be taken forward by the Mayor on energy issues over the coming year, including that the GLA will:
“…produce a detailed spatial London energy infrastructure plan by the end of 2015 that accounts for infrastructure requirements and costs, supply decarbonisation and distribution capacity over time. We intend to produce it in collaboration with the DNOs. It will establish options for cost effective energy demand and the contribution that London as a whole can make to reducing the costs of decarbonisation and increasing system resilience.”
The consultation period will last for three months with responses requested by 31 October 2014 ands plans to publish a final report in early 2015.
Posted in Decentralised Energy, News
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London Innovates…back in the 1930s
August 2014: Interesting foreword by Department of Energy and Climate Change Secretary of State Ed Davey – also MP for Kingston – to a new DECC document ‘Next Steps on CCS‘ which provides some background to Battersea Power Station:
“In the 1930s, in the midst of London’s pea-soup fog, Battersea Power Station was the first power station in the world to deploy an innovative technology known as “Flue Gas Desulphurisation” (FGD) to clean up sulphur dioxide in its toxic fumes – a key cause of London’s air pollution.
“The cost of that technology was significant and in the 1930s there were no financial or regulatory incentives to deploy FGD. Battersea was ahead of its time – for a variety of reasons, it took another 70 years before the technology was fully commercialised. But FGD is now installed in over 1700 power stations across the world and the energy industry expects to invest around $8bn in the technology in 2015 alone.
“Today the problem is not sulphur dioxide, but carbon dioxide. And to solve this problem we need more clean energy from renewable and nuclear sources, alongside cleaner energy from gas. But we also need a new generation of coal and gas power stations equipped with Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) for the 21st century.”
The Minister’s information is referenced to a case study by the UKERC which goes into a lot more detail – and highlights the role that councils played in bringing forward new energy technology!
“Where does Boris stand on climate change”?
8 August 2014: RTCC website article ‘Bicycles and bluster: Boris Johnson, wannabe prime minister‘ asks “The notoriously ambitious London mayor says he will run for parliament, but where does he stand on climate change?”
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Energy and Climate Questions to the Mayor
July 2014: This month the Mayor has been asked questions in relation to:
Mayoral involvement with the Local Government Climate Roadmap; organisations operating at the London Sustainable Industries Park; potential for the London Pension Fund Authority (LPFA) to invest in low carbon London projects; whether Energy Performance Certificate or Green Deal assessments will be provided for homes that go through the RE:NEW programme; monitoring high energy consuming buildings in London; reductions in forecasted projections of CO2 savings in Mayor’s energy supply programme; Transport for London’s (TfL) Energy Strategy; the Mayor’s Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with energy suppliers; visit by Mayor’s energy advisor to Camden’s biomethane refuelling station; correspondence with DCLG on the Mayor being able to set London specific energy efficiency targets in planning rules for new development; meetings with DECC over encouraging the use of solar PV on GLA land and building; new district heating network using heat from Greenwich Power Station; the low take up of ECO energy efficiency programme in London; connecting Whitehall District Heating Scheme to Pimlico District Heating Undertaking; the Mayor’s response to a recent London Solar Energy report by Green Party London Assembly member Jenny Jones; future TfL electricity costs; whether the Mayor responded to the Government’s recent solar PV consultation; concerns over government changes to the ECO as raised by the Mayor; funding for the next round of the RE:NEW programme; energy efficiency requirements in the private rented sector; monies received by the Green Bus Fund; work being undertaken to assess the economic impact to London as a result of climate change; attendance at the World Mayors Summit of Climate Change; planning offset funds; contract awarded for management of the RE:NEW programme; and if the Mayor’s High Level Electricity Working Group has considered solar PV.
Previous months questions to the Mayor can be found here.
London Solar Story
July 2014: Helpful new map of PV projects installed in London by Solar Century. The London Solar Story highlights that “While many rooftop solar installations go unnoticed by people below, some are more visible. London is home to the world’s largest solar bridge, spanning the River Thames, more than 6,000m² of solar panels on Blackfriars Bridge generate enough solar electricity to meet half the station’s energy needs. This iconic solar landmark can be seen on this solar map. If you are passing by, the solar panels on the Bridge can be spotted from north and south of the river, with excellent views from the Millennium Bridge.”
Research Paper on Mayor’s home energy efficiency programme published
July 2014: The results of a study of the Mayor’s home energy efficiency programme, RE:NEW, has recently been published in major academic journal Energy Policy (which – for once – is freely available online!) focussing on the first major roll-out of phase of RE:NEW, delivered between July 2011 and April 2012, where 50,683 homes underwent a RE:NEW home energy visit.
The conclusions set out in the paper are quite stark and concludes that with respect to the programme’s engagement with households, that RE:NEW:
- Visits do not generate significant pro-environmental behaviour change.
- Visits do not overcome the barriers to the installation loft and wall insulation.
The paper’s author researched the delivery of RE:NEW in three inner London boroughs and provides a helpful contribution in understanding the limitations and constraints of the programme. The paper also identifies why the design of the programme may have contributed to the challenges RE:NEW faced in achieving its goals and also in engaging effectively with householders. These include:
- “The RE:NEW programme and the specification of the visit were conceived at City Hall and were based on a policy intent of reducing carbon emissions, rather than as the result of demands or expressed desire from residents. As a result, the appetite for the programme, from householders, was questionable.”
- one of the limitations of the home energy visit was the time constraint on visits. Visits generally lasted about an hour and this was due to a number of reasons. Most of the advisors were employed as contract workers and were paid a fixed price for each visit delivered…there was a focus on the number of visits delivered, rather than the length or quality of the visit.
- the short visit length meant that advisors did not have adequate time to install all of the easy measures provided during the visit.
- The effectiveness of visits, specifically in relation to encouraging the adoption of curtailment behaviours, was limited by the expertise of the ‘energy advisors’ who had inadequate training prior to delivering visits.
- over 70% of the visits to the sample groups in local authorities B and C, the householder receiving the visit was living in rented (privately, council or RSL) housing and did not have control over the potential to install further measures.
- the GLA and the local authorities were focused on achieving different outcomes from the RE:NEW visits. For the GLA, the focus of the visits was on reducing carbon emissions, whereas for the local authorities, the focus was on reducing fuel poverty, but these differing aims are not necessarily complementary
- If an impact-oriented approach is taken to reducing carbon emissions then the focus of home energy visits may better placed be on high energy consumers, who are likely to be from more wealthy neighbourhoods and home-owners who will have the control over their properties to make structural changes. Though using tax-payers money to fund such work is unlikely to be politically acceptable
Overall, the study concludes: “Negligible savings were achieved as a result of the installation of significant measures. The impact of the visit on energy and water saving behaviours were also negligible. Overall, for these households, the impact of a visit led to an estimated average reduction in annual household emissions of 3%.”
The paper notes that some of the limitations of the RE:NEW programme have been recognised, and were set out in an evaluation report published earlier this year by the GLA (see earlier post here for background and link to paper).
A third phase of the RE:NEW programme has recently been initiated by the GLA.
Posted in Energy Efficiency, News
Tagged Energy Efficiency, Fuel Poverty, Housing, RE:NEW
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Cities, Energy & Climate Change Mitigation Conference
July 2014: Papers from the University of Leeds ‘Cities, Energy and Climate Change Mitigation‘ conference held on 10th and 11th July 2014 now available online. Nothing specific to London – however – a great presentation from Imperial College’s James Keirstead questioning what actually an ‘urban energy system’ is!
Details of James’ recent book – Urban Energy Systems: An Integrated Approach – can be viewed here.
How climate adaptation in cities creates a resilient place for business
10 July 2014: A new study by the Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP) reporting on how the “majority of the world’s major cities have disclosed that climate change presents a physical risk to the businesses operating in their cities.”
The press release sets out that CDP has “examined data from 50 cities where 78 companies have reported that they expect climate change to have a physical effect,” and the study illustrates action taken through a number of city case studies, including one looking at how London uses its planning powers.
The case study states that the GLA provides “property developers with consultancy support to implement energy policies”. However, what actually happens is that expert consultancy support is brought into the GLA to provide guidance to planning officers to ensure that developers are complying with climate mitigation policies set out in London’s spatial planning strategy – the London Plan. This is fully explained in a reference actually cited in the CDP report – which links to a GLA approval document providing background details for this consultancy spend, which sets out that:
- The GLA have procured energy engineering consultancy support from 1st April 2014 to 30th March 2018, with a value of up to £440,000.
- This technical support has helped secure CO2 emissions reductions of 36% more than 2010 Building Regulations requirements for developments
- This support helps provide officers with an assessment of complex energy systems such as Combined heat and power systems, district heating network specifications, the use of heat pumps etc.
Analysis published at the end of last month by the GLA provides some detailed information on how this consultancy support has helped secure significant levels of low carbon investment in new London developments. Full details here.
Data on climate adaptation measures installed in new London development are less well documented. A recent Mayoral Question (MQ) set out an estimate on the number of green roofs installed in London. A further related MQ touch upon the Mayor’s plan to develop an interactive map on green roofs in London.
Overview of CHP data
July 2014: CHP schemes – depending on size and fuel type – can benefit from a variety of government support mechanisms. These mostly take the form of partial exemptions from the Climate Change Levy, the Carbon Reduction Commitment (CRC), Carbon Floor Price, EU Emissions Trading Scheme, and business rates. Interaction with these mechanisms can be pretty complex at times (an overview of these are provided in the following presentations from an industry workshop last December) but critical to attaining these benefits is for the CHP scheme to achieve a ‘Good Quality’ status under the government’s CHPQA programme.
The CHPQA Standard highlights that the QA system has been place since around April 2001 providing “a methodology for assessing the quality of CHP Schemes in terms of their energy efficiency and environmental performance. This methodology is based on Threshold Criteria, which must be met or exceeded in order for the whole of the Scheme to qualify as ‘Good Quality’.” The QA programme also requires an annual submission from each CHP plant wishing to be classed as ‘Good Quality’ – and details on how to comply with this QA standard are set out in some comprehensive guidance notes posted on DECC’s CHPQA microsite here.
The CHPQA admits that “achieving CHPQA Certification may at first glance appear daunting” but fortunately, for the majority of schemes going forward in London (ie smaller scale), can access a more streamlined QA process which is available for <2MWe CHP plant (see guidance note 13). Overall, CHP schemes can be seen to go through some of the most rigorous monitoring requirements of all sustainable energy measures to receive government support.
CHP schemes in London that have achieved the CHPQA standard – and which have given consent for their details to be released – are listed on DECC’s Public CHP database here (set ‘region’ criteria to London). Aggregate CHP statistics are published in DECC’s Digest of UK Energy Statistics and regional (including London) data in the September issue of DECC’s Energy Trends journal. Further data can also be accessed on Ofgem’s CCL CHP register here. Additional detail on CHP and district heating schemes can be found on the London Heat Map.