Big pipes, big heat network - The Reengineer Monitor #4

Heat pump statistics, Jaguar EV, Ukraine solar - and more!

Photo: University of Bradford.

To kick off, I must flag this great post by climate scientist Andrew Dessler over on his Substack. Dessler explains why he remains optimistic that stopping emissions will have a rapid, dramatic effect on global warming. While there is complexity to this, it’s certainly a useful perspective to keep in mind.

Heating and cooling

I shared this on Bluesky recently: a fascinating project in Bradford will use a very large (8 megawatt) air source heat pump to supply a district heating system connecting multiple University of Bradford buildings as well as other properties. It’s unusual because air source devices are less common than ground and water source heat pumps for large-scale applications. An alternative idea would be to deliver ground- or ambient-temperature water to the buildings, where a small air source heat pump could then step up the temperature of that fluid to the required level. Distributed heat pumps rather than one large centralised one.

CIBSE Journal, from the Chartered Institute of Building Service Engineers, has published a short piece summarising a helpful guide on air-to-water heat pumps from the Passivhaus Trust.

The UK government released its latest statistics on heat pump deployments. These figures cover installations supported by government grants or schemes only and show that between July and September 2024 there were 10,554 such installations. This is the second-highest figure, per quarter, since 2018. Almost all (99%) of these heat pump installations were air source.

Buildings and infrastructure

The BBC has spoken to homeowners affected by the spray foam insulation crisis, in which lenders are increasingly refusing mortgages for homes fitted with this material.