‘Customer Energy Village’ for Northern Gas Networks starts on site
Construction work has started on a unique ‘Customer Energy Village’ which will be used to research and demonstrate different technologies for decarbonising home energy use. Napper Architects have worked in close collaboration with Arup and Northern Gas Networks to develop proposals for the project, located at Northern Gas Networks research site at Low Thornley, Gateshead. It involves building nine homes from different building eras: three 1910 terraced homes, two semi-detached 1930s houses, a 1950s bungalow, two flats from the 1970s and a detached home from the 1990s. The building types were selected to represent some of the most common residential types built in the UK in the last 120 years. They will be used to test and demonstrate different technologies which will provide an understanding of which energy solutions are best suited to decarbonise the existing housing stock and how energy use can be reduced.
Northern Gas Networks is supported by its partners including Newcastle University, National Energy Action and North East Energy Catalyst. The project secured £1.96 million from the North East Local Enterprise Partnership (NELEP) through the Local Growth Fund and Getting Building Fund.
“There is increasing awareness and urgency to address the challenges of climate change. We are all very aware and increasingly vocal about the impact our changing climate is having on our way of life, our health and the profound changes being seen in the natural environment and the need to act now to protect our future.
Home heating accounts for one third of the UK’s carbon emissions, so the way we heat our homes and use energy and other resources, such as water, needs to change quickly.Keith Owen, Head of Systems Development at Northern Gas Networks
It’s a hugely complex challenge and we need to identify a variety of solutions that will work across the wide range of homes in the UK. For this reason, each property in the Customer Energy Village has been designed in keeping with the era in which it was built rather than today’s building standards so we can fully understand the impact the original design can have on the decarbonisation of the homes we live in. This will help us identify the most efficient and affordable solutions that work to support a fair transition to low carbon living for all.”