Electrification of Heat Demonstration Project

Funded by the UK Government Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, the Electrification of Heat Demonstration Project was designed to understand the technical and practical feasibility of a large-scale rollout of heat pumps.

The Project, part of the government’s Energy Innovation Programme, aimed to recruit enough participants to install and monitor up to 750 heat pumps across three areas of Great Britain. It also sought to identify solutions for increased deployment of heat pumps across a wide range of consumers, including those living on the gas grid. Learning from the Project is expected to be shared to increase confidence in heat pump technology and to help underpin public debate and strategic decisions on the future of heat.

Consequently in June 2020, the UK Government and Energy Systems Catapult, as part of its role as Management Contractor to the Project, appointed three Delivery Contractors to install heat pumps in three locations across Great Britain:

• South East of Scotland – lead delivery contractor Warmworks working with Energy Saving Trust and Changeworks.
• North East of England – lead delivery contractor E.ON working with Newcastle City Council and Your Homes Newcastle.
• South East of England – lead delivery contractor Ovo Energy working with Kaluza, RetrofitWorks, Parity Projects and SunAmp.

Following a period of recruitment and selection of participants, where the Project was heavily oversubscribed, the installation phase of the project was completed in October 2021. 742 heat pumps have been installed, making it the largest project of its kind in the UK.

A range of different heat pump types, including hybrid heat pumps, and innovative technologies, such as heat batteries, have been installed across a broadly representative spectrum of housing types, socio-economic groups and on and off-gas grid locations.

The project now moves on to the monitoring and optimisation phase where the Delivery Contractors will collect user feedback and detailed performance data on the installed heat pumps and look to ensure they are performing optimally.

The project’s Management Contractor, a consortium, led by Energy Systems Catapult, in partnership with Delta-EE and Oxford Computer Consultants, is responsible for disseminating the project findings. This includes sharing case studies that reflect the first-hand experiences of households taking part in the programme, as described in their own words.