Tag Archives: Southwark

Southwark Heat Network Update

July 2013: Deborah Collins, Strategic Director of Environment and Leisure of Southwark Council provided a useful update of the Southwark Heat Network project at the recent BASELondon show.

1,200 Southwark properties will benefit from the district heating network, which will be fed from currently wasted heat from the SELCHP waste to energy plant, based in neighbouring Lewisham. Work has been ongoing on installing the heat mains for the scheme and it is anticipated that this month will see the completion of all remaining pipes being installed and final boiler room modifications. Testing and calibration of the scheme will run over August and September with October being the target month for heat delivery to residents.

Further information can be viewed on the following presentation.

Southwark will also see further decentralised energy systems in the borough, with CHP and PV systems being installed on the new Elephant and Castle leisure centre and also biomass and PV used in Camberwell at the new Sacred Heart school development.

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Tate Awarded first London Energy Efficiency Fund Investment

June 2013: A recent question to the Mayor helped highlight the first investment made by the London Energy Efficiency Fund. LEEF was established in November 2011 and has £100m to invest in energy efficiency retrofit to public sector-owned / occupied buildings, and has to be fully invested by December 2015.

The fund is a sub-set of the London Green Fund which is itself made up of £50 million from the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF), £32 million from the London Development Agency (LDA), and £18 million from the London Waste and Recycling Board (LWARB). The European Investment Bank manages the London Green Fund on behalf of the GLA and LWARB. Of the £100 million, £50 million has been allocated to an LEEF which has been match-funded with a further £50m by the Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS). An outline of how the fund operates is set out below.

The Mayor responded to a recent question to state that “Over the past year, the London Energy Efficiency Fund has invested £19.8m in the Tate Modern project that includes a range of innovative energy saving measures, including waste heat recovery from a substation. A number of other projects are currently being considered but are yet to be approved for funding.”

The Tate Modern project is the new extension planned for the Bankside gallery – details here – which incorporates a number of innovative energy measures including that it “will draw much of its energy needs from heat emitted by EDF’s transformers in the adjoining operational switch house. With a high thermal mass, frequent use of natural ventilation, and utilisation of daylight, the new building will use 54% less energy and generate 44% less carbon than current building regulations demand.”

Further information is set out in the environmental statement published as part of the Tate’s planning application for the extension here.

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London bottom of solar league table

June 2013: Analysis by consultancy WSP in their report – ‘Solar Success: Space Not Cash the Key for Solar’ reflects previous posts by Energy for London (see here and here), highlighting London’s poor progress when compared to other regions in relation to the installation of solar photovoltaic systems.

The conclusions summarise the Feed in Tariff Installation report data, produced by energy regulator Ofgem, highlighting local authority installations per 10,000 households.

The analysis shows that London boroughs make up 23 of the 25 lowest ranking local authorities for solar installations and the entire bottom 10 in the national league table. Westminster, Tower Hamlets, the City of London, Kensington and Chelsea, Hammersmith and Fulham, and Southwark are all found in the bottom five.

The report points out that: “Even The Orkneys at 232/10,000 houses comes 55th out of 760 on installation rates – higher than every local authority in Surrey, Kent and London – areas which receive much more sun than Scotland. To get most bang for buck, incentives should encourage the sunniest areas to get more panels than the furthest north. This, however, isn’t the case – the reality of politics over good green policies.”

Reasons for London’s limited success with PV  put forward include: “While we might think that cities should be happy hunting grounds for solar sales, in reality houses in towns are smaller, their roofs are more likely to be obscured and there’s also less owner occupation.”

Link to report here and directly downloadable here.

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Southwark Heat Services Contract Agreed

April 2013: Southwark has recently agreed and signed a ‘Head of Terms’ agreement on a heat services contract with Veolia for “the provision of low carbon heat from the South East London Combined Heat and Power (SELCHP)”. As set out in a 2012 press release from the council, the project is to to create a district energy network which will transport heat – that is currently wasted – from Veolia’s  South East London Combined Heat and Power (SELCHP) Energy from Waste plant in Lewisham, to serve six housing estate in Southwark. Further information on the project can be seen in an earlier post here.

Following a period of consultation last year with leaseholders setting out the proposals and projected reductions in heating costs (see documents heresee the ‘Statement of Case’ document in particular to the proposed reduction in heat prices to tenants), the council has now completed negotiations with Veolia. A new Southwark report sets out some of the key requirements of the agreement. These include that:

  • The cost of heat could be no more than the cost of heating using the current gas boilers. This has been agreed.
  • There could be no capital investment required from the Council. This has been agreed.
  • The full operational risk of the system should be taken by the contractor. This has been agreed.
  • A price indexation mechanism should ensure that the cost of the heat rises less than the expected rise in energy prices. This has been agreed
  • There should be significant environmental benefits including a reduction in CO2 emissions and local pollution. This has been agreed.
  • The Council should share in the benefits of any expansion of the heat network.

The contract will expire in April 2033 at the same time as the boroughs waste PFI contract with Veolia. This project has clearly taken considerable time and effort by all concerned, but particularly Southwark officers, and they should be congratulated on seeing this project through. Getting heat output from the SELCHP plant after such a long time  (the plant is some 20 years old now)  is a considerable ‘win’ and should hopefully provide energy cost reductions to Southwark residents and broader environmental benefits in terms of carbon reduction.

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Heygate Energy Strategy

April 2013:  The Mayor and Southwark Council have recently given final planning permission to the development of the Heygate Estate in Elephant and Castle which, as the following GLA press release states, will see the “23 acre site demolished and redeveloped delivering up to 2,469 new homes, a quarter of which will be affordable, as well as new shops, offices, leisure and community facilities and a park.”

As one of the largest regeneration projects in the country, there’s been considerable focus on the development – including the energy strategy for the project (details on previous posts here and here).  The final energy assessment report for the development (and updated addendum) can be accessed at Southwark’s Planning website (and directly here Strategy, Addendum).

A site-wide district heating network is being proposed connecting all apartments and commercial units supplied from a single energy centre.  The energy centre building would also include an  education centre and cafe. Which is nice…

Further information is contained in the Mayor’s Planning report on the application – paras 210 onward highlighting that:

  • A potential to link the heat network to the proposed SELCHP district heating network, in Bermondsey has been explored. This is unlikely to be viable in the near term. The applicant has committed to designing the energy infrastructure to allow future connection to SELCHP should it prove viable at a later stage.
  • A phased installation of combined heat and power (CHP) is being proposed in line with the phasing of the development. This would begin with a 263 kWe gas fired CHP unit being switched on during 2019. This would then be followed by a 985 kWe gas fired CHP unit being switched on in 2021 as the lead heat source for the site heat network.
  • The preferred renewable energy strategy for the site  is to use biomethane fuel supplied over the gas network. This renewable fuel would be produced and injected into the national grid elsewhere and then purchased as a credit to supply some or all of the gas consumption requirements of the CHP plant and gas boilers in the energy centre.
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Getting into Hot Water…

March 2013: Presentation made at the the recent Combined Heat and Power Association (CHPA) district heating conference, by Bob Fiddik, Sustainable Development & Energy Team Leader at Croydon Council, giving some valuable insights into the challenges faced when developing heat networks. The presentation includes:

  • Some of the history behind the failure of the SELCHP energy from waste plant to develop the expected district heat network anticipated when it was built – and the recent work now being undertaken to help turn this around
  • The unhappy circumstances that led to the stalling of the hugely exciting Elephant & Castle heat network project, and
  • An update to the major district heating scheme currently being planned for Croydon.

Slide 14 of the presentation sets out – as challenging as circumstances have been in the past – things are not unfortunately getting easier:

Download ‘Getting into hot water…not always that easy’ here.

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‘How Green Will the New Heygate Be?’

December 2012:  35percent.org is an useful blog focussed on sustainability issues related to the massive new development proposed at the Elephant and Castle (see earlier post on this).

The top link to the site sets out some current concerns over the energy proposals on the site, especially in relation to connecting the different energy centres on site (which would hep form a more efficient area-wide heat network), and also the likelihood of using biomethane gas (the proposal in the developers application is to use the Green Gas Certification Scheme to link the London scheme to a site which is injecting biomethane elsewhere in the national gas transmission grid). The blog entry states that no such injection schemes are currently operating, which was true at the time of writing (early November 2012) but, coincidentally, the Poundbury anaerobic digestion (AD) in Dorset began operation just over a week ago (see here and here) and is injecting renewable gas generated from the AD into the gas grid.

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London academy links to district-heating scheme

December 2012: “Connecting the Walworth Academy into the local district heating scheme was the final phase in a rebuilding and expansion of the school’s facilities, giving it a new, state of the art study environment for engineering, science, technology and mathematics.” Heat is supplied from the  Aylesbury Housing Estate’s district heating scheme. Further information here and here.

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Boroughs pushing forward decentralised energy

November 2012: In addition to a supporting 25 decentralised energy projects in the capital, London boroughs are also working on some innovative projects to support the uptake of district heating.

Two recent projects worth mentioning are Newham’s work on establishing special planning guidance – a Local Development Order (LDO) to help streamline the process for a proposed new heat network running ” predominately along public highway from Beckton to Royal Docks, Canning Town and Custom House, West Ham and Stratford, including a short length of the Greenway between Manor Road and Stratford High Street.” Further information on the LDO project is on Newham’s website here; in a report to the council here; and in a Newham Council meeting paper here.

Southwark council have also been working on developing a contract with the SELCHP waste to energy plant to offtake heat from the plant which will be supplied to a number of estates (further information on this project in an earlier post here). Details of the contract can be viewed in council papers here.

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25 heat network projects being supported in London

November 2012: A recent speech by Ed Davey, Secretary of State at DECC on the department’s emerging policy around heat energy highlighted how the efficient use of heat is being promoted in the capital through its promotion of district heating. Mr Davey stated:

“London contains an example of the potential. The Greater London Authority is supporting 25 heat network projects. These have the capacity to leverage over £230 million of investment.”

A recent Mayoral question provides a little more detail on where these schemes are:

“The Decentralised Energy Project Delivery Unit is currently supporting the development of 25 decentralised projects. The following lists the activities with the boroughs:
Projects at procurement: Brent and Camden;
• Projects at post-feasibility: Croydon, Enfield, Haringey, Waltham Forest and Westminster;
• Projects at feasibility: Southwark, Islington, Hammersmith and Fulham, Newham, Sutton;
• Projects at pre-feasibility/energy master planning: Hillingdon, Ealing, and Westminster.”

Further information on Brent’s South Kilburn DE project can be found here.
Details of the innovative scheme being supported by Camden in Gospel Oak can be found here (and recent October newsletter here), which is using heat from a Combined Heat and Power (CHP) plant situated in the Royal Free Hospital, to provide low carbon affordable heat to nearby residents.
Other information can be found in the various borough heat map reports posted on www.londonheatmap.org.uk

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The World’s Largest Solar Powered Rail Station

October 2012: Sustainable Cities Collective blog focusing on the PV array installed at Blackfriars station which includes a nice time-lapse film on the building of the development. Further posts on this scheme here.

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Climate Positive Development Project in Elephant & Castle

June 2012: “The Elephant and Castle project is one of the original developments in the C40 Climate Positive Development Program, which was created to meet the pressing dual challenges of rapid urbanization and climate change.” Read more on the C40 blog here.

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