b'18 Partner News Autumn 2022Enterpriseexisting electrified buildings, and must be explored during early design stages. After passive design solutions have been considered, active measures should be taken. Heat pump technology offers a Seasonal Coefficient of Performance (SCOP) in the region of 3.6, meaning electricity demand can be significantly reduced further. DNOs have however evaluated new heat pump technology and concluded that harmonic distortion may become an increasing issue, particularly the third and fifth order harmonic. Research indicates that heat pumps from reputable manufacturers cause less harmonic distortion. Table 1 shows data that was obtained through the modelling of a residential building which incorporated fabric upgrade, solar shading and heat pump technology. Electrification of heat:The peak electricity demand was reduced significantly because of the measures.Working collaboratively reducing the demand onThe final step that should be considered to reduce the demand on electricity networks, is the provision of on-site renewable electricity networks technologies, in particular Solar PV. In the above building example, after the provision of passive and active measures, it was found that a Solar PV array contributed 12.5% to the total electricity consumption during By FHP EES peak heating months. In total, with passive, active and renewable measures, the peak electricity demand of this representative example was reduced from 388kW to Driven by regulation and UK governmentDespite improvement in efficiencies over120kW.targets, the electrification of heat is beingrecent decades, the electrification of heat seen exponentially in buildings. It is alreadypresents a potentially huge load to electricityWhilst there are many other factors to known that this shift to electricity will, andnetworks, in particular during the heatingbe considered, it is evident that the is already, increasing stress on electricityseason. It is important that the design teamprovision of a single measure alone does transmission and distribution (T&D)personnel are aware of the requirement tonot have a major effect, but the collective networks.drive down operational energy consumptionimplementation of measures, including for electrified buildings, by adopting bothpassive, heat pump and renewable The decarbonisation of electricity and thepassive and active design solutions. energy, can result in a marked reduction in electrification of heat is wholly dependent onelectricity demand and consumption, and the transmission and distribution networksDesign and measures can enable buildings to achieve, or get close being able to support the increased demand.Passive design features, such as increasingto, operational net zero carbon.Distribution Network Operators (DNO) havethermal mass, solar shading, orientation, described the extent of load due to heatutilising daylight and natural ventilationIt is imperative that architects and electrification to be enormous and thatcan all contribute significantly to reducingbuilding services engineers work more DNOs must begin to plan. operational energy consumption in new andcollaboratively to drive down building heating demands to reduce the growing Table 1: Comparison of Base Case vs. Passive and Active Measures. demand on UK electricity networks.Base Case With Passive and Active MeasuresPeak Power Demand (kW) 388 139'