Energy Now Expo 2017

The Energy Now Expo is the only renewable energy event organised exclusively for the agricultural and rural sectors and the HPA has been pleased to be associated with the event for a number of years.

The Energy Now Expo is dedicated to the growth of renewable energy within the agricultural and rural communities of the UK. It brings together farmers, landowners and other rural business owners to engage with industry experts on the latest renewable energy opportunities available, together with the best practices in energy generation and efficiency.

The Energy Now Expo 2017 was held between the 8^th and 9th February at the Telford International Centre.  The event, which was attended by a record number of visitors, delegates and exhibitors, featured over 70 industry experts speaking across 18 specialist seminar sessions. In a comfortable seminar theatre in the centre of the exhibition area, the HPA and FETA pop-up banners were on display and on the 9^th February, Mike Nankivell, President of the HPA, chaired a seminar session specifically on the subject of heat pumps. Opening the session, Mike outlined the history and objectives of the HPA stressing that it represents all genre of heat pumps.

Mike explained that although heat pump sessions at previous Energy Now Expo events had delivered presentations on a variety of innovative and cost effective application case studies, with changes in the political landscape over the past year, the heat pump sector has seen revisions in Government heat strategy, policy and incentives and so this particular seminar session would focus on these.

Mike introduced the 4 main speakers, John Findlay, Chairman of the Ground Source Heat Pump Association (GSHPA), Ross Lowrie, Senior Policy Advisor for the Environment Agency, Marie Lomax, Senior Permitting Officer for the Environment Agency and Lizzie Chatterjee, Heat Pump Policy lead for the Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy (BEIS).

John Findlay’s excellent presentation outlined the types and operational principles of ground source heat pumps and explained how recent policy and subsidy changes should shape the future of heat pumps.

Ross Lowrie followed John and explained how the Environment Agency enforces policy and regulation relating to the application of water source heat pumps and his colleague, Marie Lomax, clarified Environment Agency permitting rights procedures regarding abstraction from water sources for heat pump installations.

Lizzie Chatterjee delivered the final presentation of the session, which explained the influence of the Renewable Heat Incentive (RHI) on the take up of heat pumps in both the domestic and non-domestic sectors. Lizzie went on to set out the Government’s recent reforms of the RHI, effective from Spring 2017.

All the presentations should become available on the Energy Now website http://www.energynowexpo.co.uk in due course.

In his closing comments, Mike Nankivell summarised key elements of the presentations and invited questions from the very attentive and appreciative audience, which numbered approximately 35, a good number for a relatively small event. Several questions were expertly addressed by the panel of speakers and discussions continued well beyond the end of the session.

Mike observed. “Although perhaps not an immediately obvious venue to be supported by the HPA, over the years the Energy Now Expo has amply demonstrated that there is significant interest in and highly suitable applications for renewable heat pump technology within the farming sector. There is little doubt that our industry can benefit from promoting the benefits of heat pumps within agricultural and rural communities.”

27-02-2017