Project to reduce heating and cooling emissions

Warwick University is leading a £5.25m project to develop energy-efficient heating and cooling technologies that will reduce UK energy needs.

i-STUTE - the Interdisciplinary centre for Storage, Transformation and Upgrading of Thermal Energy - has been funded by the UK Research Councils’ Energy Programme.

The project will combine engineering, behavioural economics and policy research

It will develop technologies to reduce energy consumption across a wide range of heating and cooling technology, including thermal energy storage, industrial heat pumps and thermal transformers.

With more than 40 per cent of fossil fuels used for low temperature heating, and 16 per cent of electricity used for cooling, Warwick University believes these are key areas to address if the UK is to meet its energy targets.

Professor Bob Critoph, Director of i-STUTE, said: “This is not simply a major engineering challenge, a great deal of work also needs to be done to make sure this technology is not only accessible and appealing but will be readily adopted by households and businesses.

“i-STUTE aims to tackle these two challenges by integrating engineering, behavioural economics and policy research.”