Prefab community heat hubs offer time- and cost-effective solution for high rise developments

We’re proud to announce that we have been awarded the contract to design and build the communal heat network and Community Heat Hub for The Green Quarter in Southall, West London. Unusually, we will be providing a prefabricated Community Heat Hub for this significant development for Berkeley Group which will, on completion, comprise of over 8,000 homes across 88 acres.

Future-homes ready

With the details of the Future Homes Standard announced, The Green Quarter is a pivotal development in terms of the measures taken to reduce its carbon footprint and to meet new regulations. The Future Homes Standard raises particular challenges for high-rise buildings and with the apartments at The Green Quarter being residential and averaging between 12 and 16 storeys.

Prefabricated community heat hub

Our low carbon solution is to provide a Community Heat Hub for this phase of 1,270 new plots. It will also supply 1,268 existing plots, thus supplying 2,538 plots in total. While heat hubs are conventionally built in the basement of high-rise buildings, at The Green Quarter, Power On will be constructing a purpose-built standalone plantroom that will house the four heat pumps that will heat this phase of the development. Unusually, it is a prefabricated structure, built in Northern Ireland and shipped across to the mainland. This is a new concept for high-rise heat hubs, which significantly reduces onsite build duration and was one of the factors that made Power On stand out to the developer, Berkeley Group.

Time saving

This prefab approach allows for rapid installation. The time and, therefore, cost savings are remarkable, with around 18 weeks to complete the energy centre, compared to 35 to 40 weeks for a traditional fit out. Power On will take full responsibility for the design and build of the Community Heat Hub, along with the installation of over 1.7km of pipework, up to the building connection.

Plug and play

The Community Heat Hub will arrive as a fully modularised fit out, manufactured for quick on-site assembly.

Alex Randall, Business Lead for Sustainable Heat at Power On says: “The Community Heat Hub is essentially ‘plug-and-play’. Whilst this is relatively common for low-rise, low-density developments, it is a new concept in the UK market to use prefab Community Heat Hubs for high rise. I believe Power On is the only company actively installing them.”

Community Heat Hub

A Community Heat Hub (CHH) is an energy centre specifically designed to provide low-carbon heating and hot water to a residential community. It is a modern, sustainable alternative to individual home boilers, using large-scale air source heat pumps. Community Heat Hubs focus on high efficiency, low temperature networks, and include thermal storage tanks to store heat when demand is low, allowing for grid flexibility. The Community Heat Hub at The Green Quarter has been designed for future expansion, with additional footprint allowed for further plant and with buried pipework also future-proofed.

Building relationships

The Green Quarter is the most recent milestone in the expanding relationship between Power On and Berkeley Group. Having already adopted the utilities networks and heat centre for a 1,374-home development overlooking The Oval cricket ground, Power On is looking to continue this partnership with Berkeley Group with plans for further Community Heat Hubs and network adoptions.