Turning homes into mini power stations could help reduce energy bills by more than 60 per cent, according to a new report.
The concept has already been deployed on a building in Swansea, where an ‘Active Classroom’ combines integrated photovoltaics (PV) and battery storage with solar heat collection. Saltwater batteries can power the classroom for two days, and over six months of operation the building has produced more energy than it has used.
(Credit: SPECIFIC/Swansea University)
Developed by Swansea University’s SPECIFIC Innovation & Knowledge Centre, the integrated approach is being rolled out for the Active Homes Neath social housing development. The new homes will feature solar roofs, shared battery storage and the potential for charging points for electric vehicles. Water heating will come via a solar heat collector on south facing walls, while waste heat will be captured and recycled.
“The scale of the potential impacts is compelling, and demands that we make considered decisions about how we meet housing needs sustainably,” said energy consultant and author of the report, Andris Bankovskis.
“It suggests that if we are prepared to take some bold decisions about the way energy is supplied and used in our homes, the rewards could be significant and lasting.”
(Credit: SPECIFIC/Swansea University)
The 16 new houses are part of the Homes as Power Stations project in the Swansea Bay City Deal, a £1.3bn regional investment announced in March 2017. According to the report, if one million homes like this were built it would reduce peak demand on the grid by 3GW, equivalent to a large central power station.
“Today’s report shows that households and the country as a whole can benefit if we design our homes to be power stations,” said Kevin Bygate, chief executive at SPECIFIC.
“The technology works, so what we need now is to build on our partnerships with industry and government and make it happen.”
Also commenting on the report, Dr Nina Skorupska, chief executive of the Renewable Energy Association said: “Efficient homes with integrated heating, solar PV, and energy storage can reduce bills, empower consumers and help us meet our carbon budgets.”
“Together these technologies create significant opportunities to speedily address pressures on both our housing and energy systems in one go.”
This is a great idea, in principle, but, while I have roof space for PV cells etc, I don’t have the room for the storage. Suppose I could go subterranean.
I agree, Chris. For parts of cities, I can foresee, central storage to level out production and demand. And then wonder how big this should be to overcome 3 wintermonths, with low solar production…. Is is a power plant? My home? WHen I still need 40% power from the grid?
wikipedia.org says salwat ~ 100 Wh/kg so with piccie pointing to ~ 100kWh batteried (~ 200 EV miles) requiring reinforced roof stuffed with ~ 100 sqmetre of slushsidised solar it’ll cost a kings ransom rendered from poor old pursey public pickpocketed via pumpishment upwards of 20p/kWh. Perniciously poisonous politrickeried persecution amplified by accompanying advert for £15k installation incentive from bankrupt Birmingham & all of it on 10th birthday bankstering was busted!
How about converting current (no pun intended) homes?
“…and over six months of operation the building has produced more energy than it has used…”
I would accept that statement only after including the energy used to extract he materials needed for fabricating all the equipment, the energy to actually build and install it, and removing it when its life cycle has ended.
This kind of propaganda does nothing to support sustainability. Here in Mexico City, the fleet of Nissan Leaf Taxis that the former city major bought to replace Internal combustion taxis have disappeared from scene, because those never met the published specs in respect to range and battery life. But even when the electrical energy for those taxi cabs was “free, given by the government”, the huge battery replacement cost was more than enough to get the owners go broke. If we want a sustainable world, we need to be HONEST as engineers, and avoid a too enthusiastic and FALSE promotion of so called “green” technologies.
It would be interesting to compare this option against other ideas for domestic power generation based on a mix of solar, heat pumps and domestic anaerobic digestors. Has a full economic analysis been done and subjected to forensic audit? Four decades ago house “engine” options were being looked into but nothing much seemed to flow from that initiative.
Could this proposed technology set be retrofitted to existing housing stocks relatively easily and at low cost? I suspect not.
Academically a good idea, ( leads to longer paid for research projects for staff), in practice useless for the present housing stock where the problem is one of cost and space.
With the ever increasing cost of electricity from the grid (recent increase of 12.5% by British Gas), it won’t be long before these schemes will be cost effective.
Grid power gets more and more expensive because consumers are paying for the huge subsidies given to wind and solar power. Neither of them are economic using present technology and, for very good reasons, can never be economic.
Adding batteries to make up for the deficiencies of wind and solar power is simply throwing good money after bad.
I note that nowhere in the article is a mention of the actual cost or that the scheme relies entirely on huge subsidies extracted, to a large extent, from poor consumers. I think this is quite disgraceful.
Not sure about retrofit, but there should be a minimum standard that makes all new houses make their own energy. I read the actual report and the two really interesting things were the interseasonal heat storage and the reduction in the need for power stations. Absolutely game changing but I expect we’ll faff around until China beats us to it again.
As we systematically destroy the national power system in the name of “carbon dioxide”, this sort of proposal will help the rich avoid the power cuts, brown-outs etc that are coming ever nearer. Most of the population are struggling to afford flats or houses and the taxes to subsidise this sort of development will be eye-watering.
As Bryan Leyland noted the name of the game is subsidies and that means taking money off the poorest majority of the population. This technology is best suited to large properties, if well subsidised of course .
Funding for innovation is important however it is also important that those involved learn from projects which are already being done commercially without subsidy and being lived in.
Our Gusto homes company has been building low energy homes for 20 years and have learned from each development. Our most recent involves 18 all electric Passive solar homes which keeps the technology simple. The 5KW/p of building integrated PV is managed through an immersun power diverter to use the hot water cylinder as a energy store and the space heating which is hardly needed is a simple infra red panels on the ceiling. With high levels of thermal mass in the fabric of the building and heat recovery on the shower waste and ventilation system the overall energy use is costing residents less than £1 a day. https://vimeo.com/131530938
Retrofitting houses initially seems a good idea with newer homes being the best due to improved thermal properties. However most modern homes are built on a postage stamp plot of land with no additional space for all the kit needed. Unless you get rid of a room on the ground floor of course. Builders pay lip service to most demands on them to improve thermal efficiency. Solar cell are not always added and of course people are put off fitting them as the agreement with the cell suppliers effectively locks the roof into their ownership. There is a way to go on the best technology for home generation yet.
Too bad that here in Lowbuck (Lubbock), Texas, the monopoly electric utility (the city), does not allow net-metering self-generation in their service area.
It would not stop someone from self-powering their own non-grid connected work shop, etc., however.
I agree with Steff Wright that new homes ought to be built to the highest economic standard and modernisation of old homes, flats and office blocks is important. As with all environmental issues cost-benefit balance is essential and all too often forgotten. What concerns me is that the emphasis on energy saving goes beyond sensible economics in the name of “Environment / Sustainability” and the other weasel-words that are used to justify subsidy far beyond the benefit obtained.
The London Towers problem is an example of poor cost-benefit assessment, where insulation added to buildings has saved minor amounts of energy at massive cost. Obviously this is oversimplification of a tragic situation, but the cladding was technically inadequate and should never have been applied.
Once again, the valued views of those, clearly expert (certainly more so than the buffoons in various Parliaments who have thought up this obvious -to experts- nonsense) offer amateurs like MJB a window into the reality, as opposed to the hype. Thank you. Breaking of Nature’s Laws (even those ‘man-made’ and well tried and tested in economics) invariably results in detection and punishment. Sadly, the instigators are rarely in receipt of the fine or sentence: particularly if they have the ear (or hands in the pocket) of politicians, often ready for the ‘bung’ and who ‘know nothing?’
I am sure The Engineer has already written about it, but it’s worth repeating. This is the present and the future of energy, 100% renewable, clean and distributed: leave no sq ft or sq m behind. Sounds and looks perfect.
http://www.wired.co.uk/article/elon-musk-solar-city-roofs
Fossil subsidies are $ 5 trillion/year globally, without including defense budgets, which are another fossil subsidy. And with no benefit for the poor, on the contrary.
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/fossil-fuel-subsidies-cost-5-trillion-annually-and-worsen-pollution/
An idle thought concerning the move to battery cars and battery houses, maybe the local grid should be DC rather than AC for the mini-grid needed to charge the 3m electric cars and distribute the battery storage. This could easily link to the national grid via transformer rectifier units where needed. Most domestic / small commercial equipment is already DC, the rest could easily be modified. Seems daft to generate DC then convert to AC to me.
Agree with Jack B. on this particular idea: DC will feed the local grid and hopefully completely displace AC, more than a hundred years late.
” but the cladding was technically inadequate and should never have been applied.”
Come on fellows, grow up! The purpose of attaching the cladding was primarily cosmetic: so that the ‘other’ nice folk in the richest borough in the UK would not have to look at a 50s/60s eyesore. When has any land-lord (just think about that word?) spent money for other than their own purposes! The difference this time is that I suspect there will be some collar lifting before too long: even some prosecutions and penalty-s, for NOT going to the appropriate spec for fire protection as opposed to ‘looks’.
Regarding the infamous and incorrect cladding used on tower blocks etc: So far as I have read, the cladding was to an EU norm that had superseded an old BS code; that is the get-out-of-jail-free card for the councils etc., (This cladding is widely used in Germany I believe). The reason for application was an EU energy saving (i.e. CO2 reducing) wheeze that required councils to upgrade buildings; the planners then go for the lowest compliant bid allowing incorrect materials to be purchased without liability.
Sadly, the enquiries are guaranteed to be Levernsonesque: huge and inconsequential.
This should only be done for new builds as a lot of the technology goes hand in hand with new construction techniqes. The cost of retrofitting existing housing stock can be 50 to 100% more than in a new build and take considerably longer. Also there aren’t enough electricians/builders around to do both new builds and retrofitting.
What we should do is concentrate on new builds, putting in the infrastructure to handle local generation of electric and heating. The older HV transformers that solar panels are feeding into are not designed with PV in mind.
With a bit more thought at the design stage and utilising shared storage of these resources (eg think cul de sac with a central hub), I can see a future for this.