Agenda item

To receive a report, Review of District Heating and Related Issues, noting the responses to the Commission’s enquiries.

The Chair invited officers to introduce themselves – Tom Vosper (Strategic Project Manager for Heat Networks), Ryan Collymore (Director of Repairs and Maintenance) and Paul Gathercole (Gas and Water Contract Manager).

Taking their report as read, the officers responded to questions from the Commission, noting that:

• guarantees against mechanical failure (for example of those components responsible for activating heating systems) could never be 100% effective and so the Council had used extensive testing of the compensating mechanisms to check for and remedy any failures
• other strategies (e.g. planned maintenance, increased testing during cold periods, AI remote monitoring-testing) formed part of the work to deliver better services
• it is planned that Acorn Estate would gain an additional source of heating via the SELCHP network providing a further line of defence in case of heating failure
• internal controls so that residents could adjust the temperature within their properties were being added (through radiator thermostatic controls, for example)
• on some estates, the existing heat pipes ran in such a way that the buildings could become hot and where it was not practicable to replace the whole system – in these cases, the Council had managed to lower operating temperatures to some extent although it was a fine balance ensuring water temperatures were hot enough to kill Legionella without creating excess discomfort for residents
• overheating can occur for a range of reasons depending on the particular system architecture in place
• work was underway to install heat metering (with accompanying radiator and room thermostat controls) so that residents had the incentive and means to maintain their property’s temperature at comfortable levels
• consultation with both homeowners and tenants on the Consort Estate had helped to identify individual problems (e.g. lack of adequate insulation on cylinders) and this work would be supplemented with longer term changes such as heat meters and controls
• 95% of the Council’s properties had mechanical or electrical thermostats to prevent the hot water from becoming too hot – having been presented with the case of one property with hot water reaching 90 degrees Celsius (then rectified), officers asked for any similar cases to be brought to their attention as the high temperatures presented a safety concern and suggested a component failure warranting urgent intervention
• the question of billing and clarity for residents was complex as there was no one process – billing differed for properties with heat meters and those without, and then by tenure type
• in addition to the above four billing types, a small number of residents in new builds were billed on a credit basis via an external company
• some residents were angry as, from 2022, they may have faced both very large increases in gas costs and increases in repairs and maintenance costs
• the gas cost element of bills has already reduced in some cases and looks likely to reduce for all residents in the future though this is market-dependent
• given the issues and strength of feeling, officers were in agreement with Members that billing should come back to a future Commission
• early indications of the trial using AI to collate and report failures early were that it was saving money and improving satisfaction – a more complete evaluation at the end of the winter should show whether it was worth continuing the investment and, if so, where it might be used elsewhere in the Borough
• isolating floors or blocks within estates so that shutdowns of heating and/or water systems can be limited to as few homes as possible while works are being carried out was possible and isolation valves had been installed across the Borough to help with this – more work was still needed and this would happen subject to available funding