Britain faces a daunting challenge to decarbonise its heating sector, which accounts for about a third of its carbon emissions and relies heavily on natural gas boilers. The government has set a target to install 600,000 heat pumps per year by 2028, but this technology is not suitable for every home and comes with high costs and barriers.
A quiet energy revolution is taking place across the country, where a different solution is being deployed: district heating networks (DHNs). These are systems that distribute hot water or steam from a central source to multiple buildings through insulated pipes, providing low-carbon and affordable heat to homes and businesses.
DHNs can use various sources of heat, such as waste heat from power plants, industrial processes, data centres, or renewable sources such as geothermal, biomass, or solar. DHNs can reduce carbon emissions, improve air quality, increase energy security, and create jobs and economic benefits.
DHNs are widely used in many European countries, such as Denmark, Sweden, Finland, Germany, and France, where they supply up to 60% of heat demand. However, DHNs are still underdeveloped in the UK, where they only supply about 2% of heat demand.
A recent report by the Energy Systems Catapult, a government-backed innovation centre, found that DHNs could be cheaper and more effective than heat pumps in many cases, especially in dense urban areas. The report also found that DHNs could enable the integration of hydrogen, which is another option to decarbonise heating, but faces technical and safety challenges.
The report highlighted some examples of successful DHNs in the UK, such as the Leeds PIPES project, which uses waste heat from a recycling plant to heat homes and businesses. The project has reduced carbon emissions by 22,000 tonnes per year and saved customers up to 10% on their bills.
However, the report also identified some barriers and challenges that hinder the development of DHNs in the UK, such as lack of awareness, regulation, standardisation, and coordination. The report called for more support and investment from the government and the private sector to scale up DHNs in the UK, and suggested some policy measures, such as carbon pricing, planning reforms, and consumer protection.
The report concluded that DHNs are a key part of the solution to the UK’s heating challenge, and that they can complement and enhance other technologies, such as heat pumps and hydrogen. DHNs can offer a flexible and resilient way to deliver low-carbon heat to millions of households and businesses and help the UK achieve its net-zero target by 2050.