Energy & Environment Webinar Series: A 100% renewable UK with a focus on heat, by Prof Mark Barrett

About the webinar 

The energy system comprises two basic parts – demand and supply. The behaviour of people using demand technologies (buildings, vehicles etc) drives energy demands which vary with hourly social activity patterns and, for space heating and cooling, also vary with the weather. Energy efficiency, such as building insulation, can reduce demands cost-effectively somewhat but there will always remain demands.

The question is: what mix of energy technologies and sources can meet these varying demands whilst having a net zero emission of greenhouse gases, and at the lowest possible cost? Our primary energy options are fossil, renewables and nuclear. Fossil use will always cause emission which, for net zero, has to be balanced though absorbing atmospheric CO₂, but the options for this are poorly developed or constrained. Nuclear is problematic because of cost, waste and security. Renewables, with wind and solar are abundant though variable, with sources such as hydro and biomass being limited.

We have a problem of matching hourly variable renewable supplies to varying demands – sometimes there’s a surplus, sometimes a deficit. There are three basic methods for matching:

1. store energy from a time of surplus to a time of deficit
2. long distance transmission from a place of surplus to a place of deficit, e.g across Europe
3. increase renewable capacity such that deficits are reduced.

In general, increasing one of these three options allows a decrease in the others. To explore designs we developed the ESTIMO (Energy Space Time Integrated Optimiser). This model uses data from the UK and Europe to simulate hourly demands and renewables using 35 historic meteorology data. The flows of energy to and from stores and the trade of energy between the UK and Europe were simulated and system costs calculated.

Several system designs were explored with different renewable, storage and trade mixes, and with different heating shares of heat pumps, district heating and hydrogen and simulated with historic and project climate change meteorology.

• Image caption: An orange flame on a black background
• Image credit: Unsplash. 

Please note, this webinar is open to everyone, but is aimed at an academic audience. No registration is required. 

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