Nearly a third of Britain’s renewable heat could be produced using underground energy, says Emmeline Saunders of Politics.co.uk, quoting a report by the Environment Agency.
Homeowners and businesses could be paid to produce their own heat using ground source heat pumps to regulate temperature in buildings and provide hot water, the report says.

There are just 8,000 of these pumps in the UK, but the agency believes 1.2 million could be installed to heat 11 per cent of homes and 40 per cent of commercial buildings if the government introduces support for them.

The renewable heat incentive, which will be in place in April 2011, legislates to give financial assistance to those who generate their own renewable heat. This will be a major factor in determining the success of ground source heat pumps, the report states.

At the moment just 0.6 per cent of all heat is generated from renewable heat sources. This will have to rise to 12 per cent in order for Britain to meet its binding EU targets by 2020.

Tony Grayling, head of climate change and sustainable development at the Environment Agency, said: “Ground source heating is a rapidly growing technology that has the potential to produce at least 30 per cent of the country’s renewable heat needs, but it needs financial support in order to grow.

“We have ambitious emissions reduction targets in the UK, and the Environment Agency would like to see rapid growth of all low carbon energy technologies to help meet these. Any delays in reducing emissions will lead to more severe impacts of climate change.”

The heat pumps are not carbon neutral as they require electricity to run, but can generate up to four times the amount of energy they use.

They have become popular in London where they are used to power large developments to meet the Merton Rule: a sustainable energy policy to reduce carbon emissions by using onsite renewable energy generation.

Ground source heat technology is commonplace in Sweden as it uses energy stored in the ground, but Britain’s electricity distribution network would need upgrading to facilitate the installation of larger heat pumps if the government was to commit to the technology.