Energy Masterplanning

We have provided energy masterplanning advice for Harvard University's 50-year expansion programme, a major international airport and a middle-eastern city. We use our bespoke energy modelling tools to generate annual-hourly load profiles for heating, cooling and electricity based only on a schedule of floor areas and building types. With this information we are able to tests the suitability of alternative energy strategies, see how effective they will be and how sensitive they are to design decisions and likely variations in usage.

The best results are achieved when synergies are identified and exploited: perhaps one space can be heated using the heat rejected from another space in need of cooling; or where cooling loads are due mostly to solar gains use solar-powered chilling; or in hot and dry climates use can be made of desiccant cooling; and so on.

Energy masterplans can be huge capital investments and so they need to be future-proofed. This means using technologies that sit on the zero-carbon continuum. There's no point using a technology that will be obsolete in 20 years unless there is a guaranteed strategy for evolving it into something that is always up-to-date. This is the big challenge facing district heating schemes using gas-fired CHP.