Behind a village's eco heat scheme that cost £14m

The Swaffham Prior heat network has cost £14m

The oil-dependent Cambridgeshire village of Swaffham Prior was a pioneer when it became the first in the UK to develop a rural heat network. It even won a renewable energy award. Four years on we look at how it works, what it has cost and what we can learn for its example.

The idea came from people living in the village near Newmarket who wanted to ditch their oil tanks and storage heaters to address fuel poverty and environmental concerns.

The council-owned heat network uses bore-holes in a field to supply ground source heat pumps; it is free for residents to sign up and about half of the homes in the village – 166 properties – were reported to have done so in 2021.

But as it stands only 100 have been connected to the network, at a cost of £14m.

What is a heat network?

Popular in Scandinavian countries, these networks supply heat from a central source to consumers.

Prof Aled Jones, the director of Anglia Ruskin University's Global Sustainability Institute, said they were the least expensive "when there is an existing heat source that is not being used close to a large built-up area".

In Swaffham Prior there are a series of bore-holes in a field close to a heat network centre on the outskirts of the village.

The bore-holes feed ground-source heat pumps, which in combination with an air-source heat pumps, takes heated water through a network of pipes into the village and people's homes.

Who signed up to the system?

With climate change in mind – coupled with an old, broken boiler – James Matheson and his wife Caroline's home became one of the properties to get connected.

"As far as we know everybody who's got it is still as warm as they were, and without the smell of oil, so in most practical respects I think it could be chalked up as a success," said Mr Matheson.

James and his wife Caroline live in one of the 100 homes connected to the network

Mr Matheson said his wife, Caroline, edits the village magazine, where people have "obviously had a certain amount to say over the years about the heating scheme" and he has questions over the cost of the project.

He said: "The point of the project was as an exemplar, potentially, for other villages. And part of that has to take into account the cost.

"If it's [£14m] per village, it's a rather expensive system. As a friend of ours pointed out, you could give everybody a heat pump for that and you wouldn't have all the disruption of digging up the roads."

Prof Jones said: "In the short-term it would have been cheaper to install heat pumps.

"However, these are not scalable. The heat network is capable of connecting many more homes at much less cost and also has a much more stable future price of heat."

He said it "future-proofs the village" and "as with all new technologies the initial installation includes a lot of learning which you don't need to do in the future, so costs for other villages doing the same thing will be much lower".

"Therefore, it is an investment not just for Swaffham but also for all similar villages in the UK in the future."

Was everyone able to join the network?

Keith Carter had wanted to join up with the scheme but his neighbours did not

Keith Carter was one of those that initially wanted to join the heat network and adapted his house in readiness.

But after a lengthy wait, the 66-year-old was finally told it would be financially unviable to connect his home, down a lane from the main road, as other neighbours were not interested.

"The problem we've had with the heating scheme is basically [the lane], which is quite long.

"It's a private road, so I need the agreement of my neighbours to dig it up, which is obviously difficult.

"And it's expensive because of the length; it's expensive for the heating scheme to dig a trench all the way down here, just to serve my house," he said.

What does the council say?

Ros Hathorn said the scheme was "100% a success"

Ros Hathorn, the chair of Cambridgeshire County Council's Environment and Green Investment Committee, said she was sorry to hear of a situation like Mr Carter's.

"The idea was always that we wanted as many properties as possible to be able to join," she said.

"However, the county council is a taxpayer organisation and it has got to prioritise value for money and cost effectiveness."

Hathorn said she had lived on heating oil herself and "it is a real pain... if [it] runs out, you might have a massive bill because it's the coldest time of the year".

The heat network was financed by a number of grants including from the government's Heat Network Development Unit and Heat Network Investment Project and investment from Cambridgeshire County Council.

She said the funding model meant the network was "not costing taxpayers" but "at the moment" the council did not have plans to do it again.

"This was a scheme that was community-led... if it was to happen again it would be set up in a different way and there have been some really, really valuable lessons learned."

When asked if she felt the project was a success, Hathorn said: "It's a scheme that has a 60-year business case and... we've got one in three of the homes who've signed up.

"Now we're getting people who are referring their friends. A lot of people wait; they want to know 'What's it like in my neighbour's house? Oh, actually, it's quite warm – maybe I'll think about it'.

"I think we all take a bit more time and making big decisions about our properties but it has cut carbon, offered a low-carbon solution, using solar power to provide the electricity; it's absolutely 100% a success."

Prof Jones believed this sort of scheme will become more common.

"Individual heat pumps will continue to be rolled out," he said. "However heat networks offer a more robust and cheaper alternative although they are harder to coordinate without proper government support."