Kensa Heat Pumps has completed a nine week heating upgrade programme featuring 11 of the Flagship Group’s properties on an estate in Fressingfield built in 2010. The project showcases the most combinations of communal ground source heat networks installed on one site to date, securing Flagship access to 20 years of income through the Non Domestic Renewable Heat Incentive (RHI), upfront grants through the Energy Company Obligation (ECO), and generating fuel savings of £350 a year for the tenants.
The need for a new heating system became apparent when residents of the five year old houses were stung with high energy bills from their inefficient electric panel convector heaters, with one customer reporting bills of £500 a month. Energy for this system could only come from one provider, making switching to reduce bills impossible. “When I moved into the house, I couldn’t believe we had electric panel heaters. I knew these wouldn’t be good for our carbon footprint. So to have a new ground source heat pump is fantastic. It is a major improvement,” commented Mr Blowers, one of the 11 recipients of a new Kensa heat pump.
Matt Smith, Contracts Manager at Flagship Group, said: “We knew we needed to innovate to solve the problem. Originally we had received a petition from customers asking for oil to be installed in their properties, but we are taking steps wherever possible to reduce our reliance on oil in favour of sustainable alternatives. After a consultation meeting, customers all voted in favour of the renewable option.”
The 11 properties at Fressingfield feature flats, bungalows, semi-detached and detached houses. The diverse make-up of the site demanded an innovative approach to the heating system design with each requiring a bespoke solution for the heat pump, cylinder and radiator location, resulting in five distinct communal ‘heat networks’. The five arrays demonstrate the diverse application of Kensa’s innovative ‘micro district’ approach, which features as few as two properties with their own heat pump connected to one communal ground array in order to qualify for the non-domestic RHI and ECO grant funding.
Kensa’s unique ‘micro district ground source heat network’ design provides each of the 11 property’s its own 6kW Shoebox ground source heat pump offering heating independence and the freedom to switch energy suppliers, whilst providing efficiencies across the communal heat network and a guaranteed return from the RHI to the Flagship Group. Flagship will be able to use this income towards lessening its impact on the environment through using more sustainable energy sources in more of its housing stock, which consists of 22,000 homes across the East of England.
Dan Roberts, Project Manager, from Kensa Heat Pumps said: “The variation of property types on this site presented an interesting challenge from a design and delivery point of view as we essentially have four different solutions for 11 properties on one site. However, this gave us the opportunity to demonstrate the flexibility and effectiveness of our systems in a wide variety of applications all in one place. Flagship and their customers were a pleasure to work with and I hope they enjoy their new heating systems.”
Rebecca Hazlewood, Flagship’s Sustainability and Wellbeing Team Leader, said: “Our Wellbeing Plan commits us to a continual improvement in our energy use and carbon footprint. This project is a fantastic example of how we can use renewable energy sources to help reduce our carbon footprint, tackle fuel poverty and support the global agreement to achieve net zero emissions by the second half of the century.”