Our Place-Based Net Zero Toolkit

Around 75% of local authorities in the UK have declare a climate emergency and targets of achieving Net Zero before 2050, yet few have a clear plan on not clear how to get there, what needs to be done in what order, or which technologies and infrastructure to invest in.

Local Area Energy Planning (LAEP) is a data-driven, whole system approach – that considers how to decarbonise the entire energy system at least cost across electricity, gas, heat and transport, down the supply chains from energy generation to distribution and consumption in homes and businesses, and across systems – the physical, digital, market and policy systems.

Bridgend Country Borough Council were one of the first local places in the country to to collaborate on a LAEP – focused initially on the decarbonisation of heat.

Working with BCBC, Wales and West Utilities and other key local stakeholders we developed a street-by-street LAEP unique to the area – that found decarbonisation of heat could be achieved at a cost premium of just 15% above the cost of decarbonising electricity alone.

The LAEP delivered future local energy scenarios; insights and evidence to help develop of a pipeline of innovation projects to transform the energy system to zero carbon over time; and identified opportunities and risks to help support more open dialogue, future engagement and investment in building retrofit, heat, gas and electricity networks.

Bridgend returned in 2021 to collaborate of extending the LAEP to include transport, energy storage and hydrogen.

Energy Systems Catapult collaborated with UK Power Networks (UKPN) under Network Innovation Allowance funding to investigate the behaviour of domestic electricity consumers and the distribution network supplying them under a Cold Start scenario in 2030.

With electrification of heating and transport expected to be at far higher level in the next decade, an extended power outage under severe weather conditions would lead to a sudden demand surge to levels far higher than normal peak levels as electrical devices are reactivated.

Using our innovative EnergyPath® Operations tool, we created a Dynamic Energy Systems Simulation using a portion of real electricity network to understand the physical impacts of fault conditions on energy assets and appliances within the network under different outage scenarios. A range of metrics were produced, including power flows, voltages, loading and balancing.

The results will allow UKPN to identify:

• Network areas with high risk of adverse effects from power restoration after Cold Start.
• Mitigation measures such as operational policies, network controls, demand-side flexibility and conventional reinforcement.
• Explore novel mitigation methods based on in-home appliance flexibility.

Mixergy has designed an innovative, smart hot water storage tank that allows consumers to heat only the water they need, in contrast to conventional hot water tanks which heat all or nothing. This saves on energy, cost and carbon emissions.

Energy Systems Catapult utilised our Home Energy Dynamics modelling toolkit to help Mixergy simulate how their hot water tank interacts with varied building and occupancy profiles without needing to deploy the innovation in the real world.

HED has been tested on a number of homes to date, to demonstrate a very strong correlation between predicted and measured energy performance, which supports validation work undertaken with Salford University’s Energy House.

David White, Head of Commercial Operations, Mixergy, said: “Home Energy Dynamics allowed us to test Mixergy’s product when deployed in a varied ecosystem of products and applications, which is often challenging to model. These insights are extremely valuable when articulating to prospective clients and stakeholders the full impact of deploying smart home technologies.

“We were really impressed with the accuracy of the model and also how it is able to quickly identify effectiveness of a solution without need for a full laboratory set-up.”

Local Energy Asset Representation (LEAR) is a modelling tool developed by Energy Systems Catapult. It pulls together local information on energy demand, generation, storage and distribution assets, social factors like fuel poverty and characteristics like building design types and local geography, using geospatial data analysis and aspects of machine learning. It enables planners and innovators to strategically decide how they might deploy and grow low carbon businesses.

The York & North Yorkshire Local Enterprise Partnership (YNY LEP) needed  a LEAR to support their vision for achieving net zero emissions by 2050 and milestone of 78% reduction by 2035. Locally, five local authorities have declared a climate emergency setting challenging decarbonisation targets up to twenty years ahead of that target. YNY LEP area covers well over 8,000 km2 and has a population of around 825,000 people.

YNY LEP requested their LEAR provide an understanding of the building stock in the local area by geographic location, including analysis of:

• Types of dwellings including building fabric
• Types of heating systems
• Annual and peak energy demands
• Potential for domestic on-roof solar PV and off-street parking for electric vehicle charging
• An assessment of energy networks that serve them including capacity and embedded generation.

The LEAR also provided information on the levels of employment and deprivation correlating to the building by building assessment in each area.