Arch, the company responsible for economic regeneration in Northumberland,
has turned to micro inverter technology from Enphase to drive down the
energy costs of its housing residents
Arch commissioned Saving Energy Renewables North East to examine green
energy options for bringing its most vulnerable tenants out of fuel poverty by
reducing their fuel bills.
Arch’s housing project brought several design challenges for a solar
solution. Almost all of its houses in the Ashington Hirst area of the county had a
70 degree variance from south, and many had extension roofs in addition to the
main roof construction.
Saving Energy Renewables North East believed that this would create a
challenge for traditional string solar designs, as it meant installing and linking
two separate arrays on a single property. Additionally, shading from surrounding
trees made it imperative that available daylight was optimised.
Enphase’s M215 micro inverter system was selected for the job with its
Enlighten monitoring platform displaying the 1MW system’s generation data
and reporting on the performance of Arch’s investment.
With the safety of residents a principle concern, Kris Laver, Saving Energy
Renewables North East’s PV operations manager, said: “The safety of DC ending
above the roof, not in roof, provides complete peace of mind for the client.”
Feed-in Tariff revenue will be re-invested into replicating residential installs
onto Arch’s commercial buildings.
Around the houses
Home front: Social housing residents in the Ashington Hirst
area of Northumberland have cut their living expenses via
the installation of solar PV and Enphase micro inverter
technology
Liquid gold
Avington Park in Hampshire has reduced its energy costs and carbon footprint
with a water source heat pump from Ecovision Renewables
As well as being a family home, Avington Park is a venue for parties, weddings and corporate functions. Owners Sarah and Charlie Bullen
wished to replace three ageing and increasingly expensive oil and LPG boilers.
The inspiration for a renewable solution came from reading an article about the owner of Castle Howard, who halved his annual energy
bill by extracting energy from his lake.
“We had been led to believe that it was not feasible to use this type of renewable energy in an historic house such as ours, but it
worked in Castle Howard,” said Sarah Bullens.
“It was clear from the article that Simon Howard completely believed
in his WSHP system and that he was a great advocate of the technology.
He told me that Ecovision had worked closely with him and that he highly
recommended its team.”
To extract heat from a tributary of the river Itchen, Ecovision placed
24 x 200 metre loops which sink to the bottom of the river. A 120 metre
trench was dug from the plant room housing the heat pump to the loops
in the lake. The Dimplex 130kW WSHP is connected to Avington’s existing
radiator system.
“Our annual RHI payment will be around £6,500 a year and combined
with the significant savings we are making on oil costs, it will pay for itself
in six and a half years,” added Sarah.
“We are really thrilled to bits with our renewable energy solution. The
house
has a constant temperature and we, and our tenants, are now warm
Imitation game: Avington Park, Hampshire, has installed a water
source heat pump following the success of a similar installation at all of the time.”
Castle Howard, Yorkshire
www.renewableenergyinstaller.co.uk | 37