Markets & Policy

Online tool shows CO2 savings for UK homeowners with heat pumps

British Gas has developed the Carbon Cruncher tool for the UK market. It contextualizes emissions by comparing them to other emitters.
Lior Kahana
By
Lior Kahana
Image: HarmvdB, Pixabay

Utility British Gas has developed a tool that calculates how much CO2 a UK home can save by switching from traditional home-heating systems to modern heat pumps. The Carbon Cruncher calculator is available on the company’s website.

“The content shared is highly UK-specific and uses data published by UK authorities,” the company told pv magazine. “The data could only be comparable to other countries with a similar climate, housing stock and home heating landscape.”

The calculator has users input the number of rooms and residents in their homes. Alongside the potential CO2 savings from switching to a heat pump, the website compares these emissions with common CO2 emitters and offsetters like long-distance flights and carbon-absorbing trees.

“Based on the average UK household’s annual energy consumption of 12,000 kWh (a two to three bedroom house currently using a mains gas heating system), we calculate that switching to an air source heat pump could save 1,404 Kg of C02 annually,” said British Gas.

The company said it uses data from the Office of Gas and Electricity Markets (Ofgem) to calculate average energy usage for space heating and hot water in homes. The emission efficiency ratio is taken from the UK’s Energy Performance Validation Scheme.

“Next, we compare this value against the CO2 emissions produced by the same property type with an Air Source Heat Pump (ASHP) heating system,” said British Gas. “The difference between the two final values is the amount of CO2 that can be saved by switching to an air source heat pump.”

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