Trial / Demo
The year 2030 is less than 9 years away. For many local authorities throughout the UK who have declared a climate emergency it is the year they have pledged to achieve Net Zero Carbon by.
This is a significant challenge.
Bill Gates, known for his efforts through his foundation in raising awareness of and tackling Climate Change, made headlines stating that ‘solving COVID-19 is very, very easy compared to Climate change. Climate Change will be the most amazing thing humanity has ever done, but it will be a daunting task. Net Zero is where we need to get to’.
The challenge for Local Authorities increased significantly at the start of 2020 with the devastating effect of the COVID-19 pandemic forcing budgets to be reset, and inevitably emptying whatever cash reserve there may have been.
The Carbon Trust have raised the question that while many Local Authorities have signed up to NZC by 2030 (20 years ahead of the UK Government) how can they deliver robust and measurable change? Discussing this question with various authority leaders, the Carbon Trust discovered a strong will to achieve NZC, they also identified common key challenges:
The good news, is that IES understands these challenges and our technology provides a solution.
Many local authorities benefit from using IES technologies. Perth & Kinross Council have been using IESVE within both their Energy Management and Buildings Teams for some time. By using IESVE the teams are able to ensure that their estate energy and carbon performance is monitored in detail. This allows the Council to understand what their built environment performance is, and crucially create a strategy for improvement – a key solution to achieving Net Zero Carbon.
“We’ve added IES to our specification as our preferred modelling software because of the success we’ve had with it. The support we’ve had from IES in the package we’ve got is great and we’ve just invested in some more training as well. We’ve also noted significant cost savings, particularly from our £10 million corporate office refurbishment where we used iSCAN which highlighted a lot of alteration required at commissioning, handover and in use stages.”
- Chris Anton, Energy Officer, Perth & Kinross Council
IES technology offers and end to end solution for local authorities. Giving local authorities control of their buildings carbon emissions from Design to Operation, whether it’s a single building or the entire estate.
Stirling Council embarked on a smart city project. Using IES technology they were able to create a centralised smart energy platform where the council could easily monitor and manage energy and renewables data for its property portfolio. Although the council had strong vision and commitment, they were struggling to find adequate tools to achieve their goal. This is where IES Digital Twin technology was able to help – again a key solution to achieving Net Zero Carbon.
“IES managed to interpret our vision to create this exciting bespoke Smart Energy centre which allows us to quickly identify faults, anomalies and energy savings. The system has huge potential and I look forward to working with IES to bring the rest of our portfolio on board and to find out what further enhancements can be made.”
- Grace Conner, Energy Officer, Stirling Council
Regardless of where you currently are on your Net Zero carbon Journey, Local Authorities can benefit from IES Digital twin technology. Of course, many local authorities have been using IESVE for years to ensure their buildings are performing efficiently. Whether that be reducing overheating, energy, carbon, or testing the feasibility of renewable technology. Buildings are becoming more complex and design approaches more wide ranging. I was interested to read recently about how Passivhaus is being applied to buildings other than residential, in particular schools.
Harris Academy Sutton is the first, and largest, Paassivhaus secondary school project in the UK. The principles of Passivhaus are compelling, particularly as we drive towards our Net Zero Carbon future. However, it’s important to note that Passivhaus is a design approach and not a replacement for detailed analysis provided by IESVE, instead successful projects are made when Design and Analysis work hand in hand. Speaking with the engineers on the project, they confirmed that IESVE was used to produce a full energy model (TM54) to ensure the design would work.
Of course, local authorities can also use IESVE for refurbishment projects as they do for new builds. SSE Enterprise recently completed a local authority refurbishment project, achieving performance results significantly more than forecast. This particular Local Authority project was an Energy Performance Contract procured through the RE:FIT Framework.
The building was to be repurposed and updated for its new use as office space and to house their primary servers. The local authority also aimed to achieve an operational energy use reduction of 20%+. Intensive cooling for the servers rooms while the rest of the building heated by an aging wet radiator system, the solution was to use a Daikin heat recovery system, heating the building from the exhaust heat of the server rooms. A clever system but to complete as required by the EPC contract, savings from the proposed Energy Conservation Measures (ECM) were to be quantified. The detailed analysis provided by IESVE enabled SSE to quantify and validate the solution.
“The concept of retrofitting a VRV IV heat recovery air conditioning system to transfer warmth from a server room to an office is simple, but guaranteeing the energy savings is complex because of intricate building physics. Collaborating with IES and Daikin enabled me to build a ‘Digital Twin’ and underpin investment with significantly reduced risk. The results of this project prove that collaboration and digital technology are the key to a net-zero future”
- Tunde Olaoye, Senior Energy Solutions Engineer, SSE Enterprise
Whether you are a Local Authority about to build a School, refurbish existing offices or working towards Net Zero Carbon, IES is here to support you through our detailed analysis technology. Find out more via www.iesve.com or contact our sales team.
