A report in House Builder has revealed that the community heat hub will be trialled at Taylor Wimpey’s Chilton Woods scheme in Sudbury, with a planning application for the heat network submitted this month.

GTC’s heat network solution for traditional, new build, low rise developments involves hot water being produced centrally in a hub, using large scale heat pumps powered by grid electricity.

GTC said its system “should comfortably meet the anticipated carbon emissions requirements of the 2025 Future Homes Standard”, decreasing carbon by 75-80% against current Building Regulations.

It explained that the hub would transfer hot water to each individual home through a “highly insulated” plastic pipe heat network, supplying instant heating and hot water, with a thermal storage tank replenishing itself when wholesale electricity costs were lower. “This store reduces peak demand on the grid, lessening the need for reinforcement. Back-up electric boilers ensure a resilient supply of hot water,” GTC said.

The utility provider said that with changing regulations supporting lower operating temperatures, insulated plastic pipes were now a viable choice; previously heat networks could only utilise steel pipes. The change now also made heat networks “cost-efficient on low density developments”.

The community heat hub will provide homeowners with a reliable supply of heat and hot water directly into their homes from a central point on the scheme, “owned and maintained by a specialist company - a similar experience to using gas,” GTC said.

With the increase in renewable energy generation from wind and solar, GTC also stated that the grid was “moving towards” net zero carbon for 2050, with the community heat hub solution automatically becoming net zero “when the grid gets to this point in 2050”.

Stephen Andrew, group technical director at Taylor Wimpey, said: “As we move towards the Future Homes Standard (FHS) in 2025 and the introduction of zero carbon heating with no natural gas, the network heat pump offers an innovative solution to meet FHS.

“Whilst this was previously used in dense high rise apartment schemes, this innovative approach offers the opportunity to provide community heating to other types of residential developments, including family homes. We are pleased to be trialling the GTC community heat network at Chilton Woods, Sudbury.”

Business and Energy Minister Lord Callanan said: “Low carbon heat networks can help households and businesses move away from expensive fossil fuels. Systems like this one developed by GTC will accelerate the rollout of the technologies we need to achieve this.”

GTC said it was rolling out its community heat hub solution to other major housebuilders and landowners.