Nottingham University Hospitals Partners With EON For Carbon Free Energy

Nottingham University Hospitals (NUH) NHS Trust is partnering with energy supplier E. ON to install a geothermal heating and cooling system to help reduce its carbon emissions.
It is anticipated that the new Queen’s Medical Centre heating and cooling system will cut CO2 emissions by around 10,000 tonnes or 30% a year initially which is the equivalent of taking more than 2,200 cars off the road. The cut in carbon emissions will increase to around 43% once the current gas-fired heating system is decommissioned. Local air quality will also be improved by the reduction of nitrous oxide emissions. 

Anthony May, the chief executive of NUH, said:

"This partnership demonstrates our significant commitment to environmental sustainability and offers a creative solution to meeting our energy needs and tackling climate change, while at the same time improving patient and staff comfort by allowing us to better manage temperatures within our buildings. Innovative projects like these will play a hugely important role in helping us meet our ambitious goal of achieving a net zero carbon operation for heating and cooling system emissions by 2040."

At the heart of the initiative will be a £15m new energy centre which will be built and operated by energy firm E.ON. The installing of a geothermal heating and cooling system is part of a £64m project to make the Queen’s Medical Centre site more energy efficient.

The new energy centre will house four high-efficiency air source and ground source heat pumps. The ground source heat pumps will draw and store natural warmth from the earth via 64 boreholes, each up to 250m below ground which is comparable to the length of seven Nottingham trams end to end. The QMC’s new heat pumps, boreholes and heat recovery system will work alongside the hospital’s existing combined heat and power plant providing a more sustainable low carbon source of heating and cooling as well as a source of electricity for the hospital. 

The heat pumps use electricity and can either generate heat from the outside air (similar to a fridge but in reverse) or they can take renewable heat from the earth through the 64 boreholes drilled beneath the hospital site. 
Work has already begun on the first phase of the energy centre development to install a 4MW heat pump with 2.88MW cooling capacity to support the QMC’s existing gas turbine and standby boilers.

The project will also include the replacement of up to 18,000m2 of windows which is equal to the size of two football pitches, with double glazing which will not only improve energy efficiency by reducing heat loss in the winter and heat gain in the summer but will also improve the comfort of staff, patients and visitors. NUH and E. ON are already working with Wilmott Dixon and Acorn Aluminium to replace around 12,000 single glazed windows on the 38-acre QMC campus, The installation of smarter building controls will also be included in the works. 

Chris Norbury, E. ON UK Chief Executive, said: 

“Tackling the environmental impact of heating, especially in densely populated areas, is key to meeting the UK’s net zero targets. Part of that urgent challenge is re-imagining how energy is provided to homes, businesses, and cities to explore what can be done to take action and reduce carbon on a large scale. We’ve provided a source of heating and cooling to the QMC for many decades with an E. ON energy site in the grounds of the hospital. I’m proud Nottingham University Hospitals are trusting us to build on our successful relationship with this project, clearly demonstrating how working towards net zero can also have a direct benefit for the people who work, visit, and stay at the hospital.  We’ll be working alongside local companies to bring this to life and deliver a future-proofed energy system for Nottingham and beyond.”

Phase two will increase the heat pump solution to 8MW of heating capacity which is equal to the heat demand of almost 4,600 average UK homes integrated with a further 5.8MW of new cooling capacity. 

The heat pumps can also recycle waste heat from the hospital’s cooling systems. Surplus heat can either be saved for future use in the thermal stores within the energy centre or pumped down into the boreholes for longer term storage. This process will cut carbon emissions and running costs by reducing demand for fossil fuels.

This project has received more funding than any other project from Phase 3 of the Public Sector Decarbonisation Scheme which was initiated by the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero and delivered by Salix Finance. The programme is being facilitated by the Carbon and Energy Fund (CEF) which manages complex energy infrastructure upgrades for the NHS.
A new building management system run by E. ON Control Solutions will improve control of the building and its equipment, optimising energy efficiency to improve sustainability and reduce energy costs.

Ian Rodger, Salix Finance Director of Programmes, said: 

“This is an exciting time for Nottingham University Hospitals NHS Trust as it takes major steps to reduce its carbon emissions. It is an important project and Salix will work very closely with the Trust to support it in meeting its deadlines and major benchmarks during its decarbonisation journey. Not only will this have a significant impact for the environment but also for the community and everyone who uses trust facilities across its sites.”

Clive Nattrass, Carbon, and Energy Fund CEO, said: 

“Replacing six miles of windows in a live hospital, recovering from Covid backlog, has made this project especially challenging. It has taken close partnership working between Salix, the Trust, E. ON and the CEF to keep this ambitious project on track, towards being an exemplar ‘whole site’ project for the whole NHS.”

There are many benefits to the new heating and cooling systems being installed at the Queen’s Medical Centre including the following:

• Reduction of energy waste by recycling heat that would otherwise be ejected into the air.
• Reduction of energy dependence on fossil fuels and the cutting of carbon emissions by using an electrical system.
• Improvement of patient, staff, and visitor comfort through the thermal improvements.
• Increased security of energy supply while making the best use of space in a congested city centre. 

Currently the QMC runs off a gas turbine providing combined heat and power which E. ON has operated since 2001 but this will now be supplemented by the new renewable technology and eventually the gas turbine will be decommissioned.