Local Energy Planning in the UK: Past Experience and New Initiatives

Abstract

Energy problems crowd into the headlines at ever more frequent intervals. Major studies in North America and continental Europe have pointed to energy efficiency programmes administered at the local level as providing a substantial part of the solution. However, local energy initiatives remain weak in the UK. This paper analyses the structure of Britain's energy economy and the strategy which has been pursued by the country's highly centralised energy institutions. It continues by taking a look at the interest that has been increasing at the local level to implement effective energy efficiency measures, including the development of municipal heat distribution systems (district heating - DH) that could make use of waste heat from electricity generation (combined heat and power - CHP) and other sources, to reduce local heating costs and the national energy bill. It goes on to note how so far central agencies have done little to bring about effective action and appear, rather, to have had a discouraging effect on these developments. The longer term answer is seen as involving substantial decentralisation of power in the energy field through institutional changes.