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Gas heating: The Energy Efficiency Podcast – episode 5
Gas Heating
A Tesco supermarket
Welcome to Gas Heating: The Energy Efficiency Podcast – episode 5, the podcast that brings you a mix of energy efficiency news, products and tips all year round. We’re interested in profiling people and products involved in promoting energy efficiency habits, products and information, so please do get in touch if you have something to contribute.
This week: gas heating, where to start with draughtproofing your home, and energy efficiency in self build. Before we get on with our advertised features, the Guardian recently ran an article suggesting that supermarket fridges could form a nationwide virtual battery for the National Grid. Research in a mocked-up supermarket, undertaken by Tesco and the University of Lincoln, shows that electricity can be provided in short bursts to the grid by briefly stopping power to supermarket fridges. Power is already turned off to the fridges each day to allow for deforsting, and the proposed system would replicate this. The power wouldn’t be off long enough to affect the food, but the top-up power could help balance a dip in the grid’s energy supply.
The Guardian article quotes Professor Simon Pearson of the University of Lincoln:
Cold food is, in fact, the UK’s largest battery. There is sufficient ‘cold energy’ in the food to keep a refrigerator cold if the system reduces power for short periods to help offset power shortages on the National Grid.”
The National Grid already operates this type of system with companies that own utility-scale batteries. Increasing the scale of the operations to include a nationwide supermarket chain increases capacity while helping supermarkets reduce their carbon footprint. Commercial refriferation systems make up about 12% of the UK’s carbon emissions, with energy bills accounting for 1/3 of costs for a typical retailer. This is one example of technology helping the UK to reach its net zero target.
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Gas heating
An oil tanker delivering to a rural area
Last week we looked at district heating networks, concluding that they were more energy efficient than heating produced by individual boilers, and ideally produced their heat from renewable sources or waste heat. This week we look at mains gas heating. Wikipedia defines natural gas as “a non-renewable hydrocarbon”, describing it as “a major cause of climate change” both in itself if it leaks, and because of the CO2 emitted when it’s used.
Widely available
Gas heating is far more widely available than district heating, but it isn’t available everywhere. Rural areas tend to be less likely to be connected to the gas network, so oil is a more commonly used fuel in the countryside. OVO Energy states that 3.9million homes in the UK are without gas heating, and Citizen’s Advice Scotland quotes a figure of 46% of households in Wales without access to gas.
In the UK the average gas-connected home is built from the 1950s, and average off-gas home up to the 1930s. Of gas-connected homes, over 75% are within bands A-D of the Energy Performance Certificate rating, ie the best-performing four bands.
8 million gas boilers are sold in the UK every year. Simply, they heat up water to pump through pipes to radiators and provide hot water to kitchen and bathrooms. According to Rointe, suppliers of electric heating infrastructure, gas heating systems haven’t changed much over the years. They tend to be more expensive to install than electric systems, being more complex, and don’t last as long. Gas heating comes with the risk of carbon monoxide leaks and burst pipes, and is the UK’s biggest greenhouse gas emissions source.
Cheap to use
The Energy Saving Trust describes gas as usually being the cheapest form of heating fuel available, and having the lowest CO2 emissions apart from wood. OVO has pulled together data on energy prices and the energy efficiency of the most commonly used forms of fuel, and presented t
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By The Energy Efficiency PodcastGas Heating
A Tesco supermarket
Welcome to Gas Heating: The Energy Efficiency Podcast – episode 5, the podcast that brings you a mix of energy efficiency news, products and tips all year round. We’re interested in profiling people and products involved in promoting energy efficiency habits, products and information, so please do get in touch if you have something to contribute.
This week: gas heating, where to start with draughtproofing your home, and energy efficiency in self build. Before we get on with our advertised features, the Guardian recently ran an article suggesting that supermarket fridges could form a nationwide virtual battery for the National Grid. Research in a mocked-up supermarket, undertaken by Tesco and the University of Lincoln, shows that electricity can be provided in short bursts to the grid by briefly stopping power to supermarket fridges. Power is already turned off to the fridges each day to allow for deforsting, and the proposed system would replicate this. The power wouldn’t be off long enough to affect the food, but the top-up power could help balance a dip in the grid’s energy supply.
The Guardian article quotes Professor Simon Pearson of the University of Lincoln:
Cold food is, in fact, the UK’s largest battery. There is sufficient ‘cold energy’ in the food to keep a refrigerator cold if the system reduces power for short periods to help offset power shortages on the National Grid.”
The National Grid already operates this type of system with companies that own utility-scale batteries. Increasing the scale of the operations to include a nationwide supermarket chain increases capacity while helping supermarkets reduce their carbon footprint. Commercial refriferation systems make up about 12% of the UK’s carbon emissions, with energy bills accounting for 1/3 of costs for a typical retailer. This is one example of technology helping the UK to reach its net zero target.
—
Gas heating
An oil tanker delivering to a rural area
Last week we looked at district heating networks, concluding that they were more energy efficient than heating produced by individual boilers, and ideally produced their heat from renewable sources or waste heat. This week we look at mains gas heating. Wikipedia defines natural gas as “a non-renewable hydrocarbon”, describing it as “a major cause of climate change” both in itself if it leaks, and because of the CO2 emitted when it’s used.
Widely available
Gas heating is far more widely available than district heating, but it isn’t available everywhere. Rural areas tend to be less likely to be connected to the gas network, so oil is a more commonly used fuel in the countryside. OVO Energy states that 3.9million homes in the UK are without gas heating, and Citizen’s Advice Scotland quotes a figure of 46% of households in Wales without access to gas.
In the UK the average gas-connected home is built from the 1950s, and average off-gas home up to the 1930s. Of gas-connected homes, over 75% are within bands A-D of the Energy Performance Certificate rating, ie the best-performing four bands.
8 million gas boilers are sold in the UK every year. Simply, they heat up water to pump through pipes to radiators and provide hot water to kitchen and bathrooms. According to Rointe, suppliers of electric heating infrastructure, gas heating systems haven’t changed much over the years. They tend to be more expensive to install than electric systems, being more complex, and don’t last as long. Gas heating comes with the risk of carbon monoxide leaks and burst pipes, and is the UK’s biggest greenhouse gas emissions source.
Cheap to use
The Energy Saving Trust describes gas as usually being the cheapest form of heating fuel available, and having the lowest CO2 emissions apart from wood. OVO has pulled together data on energy prices and the energy efficiency of the most commonly used forms of fuel, and presented t