Wind-powered Heat: Powering clean heat with clean energy to cut costs and emissions

At Possible, we want to speed up the transition to a zero carbon heat and energy system, where we can all afford to keep our homes warm without heating up our planet. So we commissioned energy experts Regen to explore a home heating system that could replace gas boilers - electric heating technology, powered by locally produced renewable energy.

Regen explored how well wind power availability matched up with heat demand (spoiler: really well!), added in solar and batteries, and looked at how this could work - including how much it could take off our energy bills and emissions. We found that using clean wind energy to power heat pumps would be a win-win, for us and for the climate.

Here are some of the best bits:

• Wind power would be a great match for heat pumps.
  Because it’s windier in the colder months, we can produce more clean power when we need more heating. In fact, local wind power could directly power two-thirds of the energy needed to run heat pumps in the typical community we explored.

• This model would help UK reach its climate goals.
  The carbon savings from a wind-powered-heat model would be sizeable, reducing emissions by up to 90% compared to gas heating, and by two-thirds compared to running heat pumps on grid electricity.

• This model could cut heating bills by nearly a third!
  Heating homes using heat pumps powered by community-owned, local wind power would be be considerably cheaper for consumers than gas boilers, and could lift thousands of households out of fuel poverty.

  • The annualised costs of clean heat plus wind power would be a quarter cheaper than gas heating, and if you add in solar and storage, the savings would be up to nearly a third off energy bills.

    3,700 of the most deprived neighbourhoods in England, with greatest risk of households there living in fuel poverty, are within 1km of an area with good onshore wind resources. This means that communities most in need of clean, cheap, secure heating and energy should be able to get it.

• Community-owned energy projects bring a range of additional benefits.

  Local energy projects, like those modelled in this report, would bring local benefits including investment, skills and jobs.

While the report tells a positive story (a reliable, affordable and climate-friendly heating system is within reach), it calls for government action. The reality is, there are a number of policy barriers that are standing in the way of the development of projects like this, which make clean heating cheaper by powering it with clean electricity. And unless the government takes action, we won’t be able to reap the benefits laid out in the report.

What’s stopping us getting on with delivering clean heat?

These are the barriers standing in the way:

• The way that charges are added to households’ energy bills make electricity more expensive compared to gas. This makes it harder than it should be for people to get off gas.

• There are still planning barriers making it really difficult to get new onshore wind project in England.

• Projects need funding to get started.

• And communities need time, energy and expertise to get going with projects like this.

So, what needs to happen now?

To tackle these barriers, and unlock the clean energy and heat we need, here’s what needs to happen:

• We need changes to energy bills, so households see cost savings from getting off gas and onto clean heat.

• We need to properly unblock wind power, so that communities who want wind can get it.

• And we need more support for communities which want to kick start their own clean energy and heat projects.

Want to tell your MP about this? We’ve got a handy form you could use!

Why is this report important?

Replacing gas boilers with clean home heating will be vital to protect the climate. At the moment, one seventh of the UK’s emissions come from home heating! And a lack of clean, affordable heat is harming people too - not to mention costing the NHS hundreds of millions of pounds each year to treat the health problems that come from living in cold, damp homes.

But the problem is that we’re just not moving fast enough to replace gas boilers with heat pumps. To speed this up and make this easier for people, we need heat pumps to be cheaper than gas boilers. 

This report shows that this is possible - but it needs clean, local energy to be in the mix, too. And scaling up clean heat at the speed we need is going to take more action and support than communities currently have.

So, let’s get on with it!