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Vital Energi are one of seven employers supporting an important initiative by Generation UK which aims to train, support and place unemployed people into high demand and meaningful jobs.

The scheme involves a 10-week programme to equip learners with the technical and behavioural skills they need to thrive in the green energy sector as Retrofit Advisors.

Retrofit Advisors are in growing demand across energy companies, specialist installers, housing associations and local councils.  It’s estimated we’ll need ~10,000 skilled retrofit professionals by 2025 alone.

Jess Sewter, Partnerships Director for Generation in Leeds City Region explains, “We’re looking to bring the success of our bootcamps to a new green jobs programme for the region, working with Trustmark and the Retrofit Academy and with support from funding partner Macquarie and local employers in the sector.”

Businesses across the sector already report capacity challenges and the difficulty in finding people with the right skills and aptitude for these roles, whilst at the same time youth employment has been severely impacted by the pandemic, especially for those from underrepresented backgrounds.

The Retrofit Advisor programme launches 14 March 2022 and is open for applications from anyone 18 and over, living in Leeds City Region and not in education or employment. The programme suits those eager to make a difference to climate change, provide great customer service, and embark on an exciting new career.

To book on to the programme or find out more about the application requirements, please use this link https://genuk.online/Vital

We’re making great progress on the development of Energetik’s Meridian Water Energy Centre at the Edmonton EcoPark in Enfield.

After commencing construction last February and completing groundworks throughout spring and summer, the structural steel frame of the energy centre was completed at the end of December.

Construction has progressed well and to plan, even with challenging site coordination and logistics to manage. Now the site has reopened after the Christmas break, we’ll be focussing on the internal building work and services installation. As the building is now partially weathertight, we have commenced the external cladding works, and the installation of the thermal stores will begin in the next couple of months.

Chris Beckwith, Vital Energi’s Construction Director, said:

“Vital Energi have all future works procured well in advance to enable us to guarantee the timely completion. This year should bring some exciting challenges with the installation of the mesh cladding to the building, the flue and thermal stores installation, and the complex pipework infrastructure within the energy centre itself.”

Energetik’s energy centre will eventually make use of otherwise wasted heat energy to serve tens of thousands of homes and businesses across north London with very-low carbon heating and hot water. This heat energy will be recovered from the nearby Energy Recovery Facility, due for completion in 2026, and will effectively reduce the carbon footprint for heat and hot water of these homes by over 90% compared to a traditional individual gas boiler system. With the capacity to supply over 50,000 homes and business with fairly priced and environmentally friendly energy, Energetik will support the borough’s regeneration ambitions and help tackle both fuel poverty and the climate emergency across Enfield and beyond.

Jayne Clare, Energetik’s Managing Director, said:

“Construction of our energy centre marks a major milestone for Energetik and all our partners. It will allow us to utilise a local, sustainable heat source and supply thousands of homes with low carbon heat and hot water, generating huge carbon savings and contributing towards Enfield’s climate action plan objectives.”

We’ve been out and about this month exhibiting at both IRPM and The Distributed Energy Show, where we’ve had lots of great conversations about our energy solutions..

We were a Silver Sponsor of IRPM, which took place on 1st December at the Queen Elizabeth II Centre, Westminster. Our Head of Sales Katy Lister, along with Business Development Executive, Glenn Harrison, showcased our Operation & Maintenance and Metering & Billing capabilities to managing agents and property managers from across the country.

We enjoyed discussing our energy solutions including decentralised energy generation, energy conservation measures and multi-utility network distribution schemes based on low carbon or zero carbon technologies at The Distributed Energy Show in Telford on the 8th and 9th December.

In addition to our exhibition space at the show, Vital’s Chief Strategy Officer, Nick Gosling, joined Dr Joel Hamilton and Tim Ward from the Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy (BEIS) to discuss Heat Network Innovations – a session which was very well attended.

We’re looking forward to attending more events like this in 2022.

We recently visited the Newington estate in Southwark, where we joined Southwark Council, ICAX Ltd, residents connected to the network, and the Tenants and Residents Association, in planting 5,000 daffodil bulbs across the estate.

Contracts Manager, Mark Pocknell, who is overseeing the project, said:

“We’re committed to bringing social value to places where we deliver projects, and so last week we joined Newington residents and planted 5,000 daffodils across their estate. It was a really enjoyable day – we were lucky with the weather and it only took around 2 hours to plant all the bulbs.

“I’d like to thank everyone who got their hands dirty, and I can’t wait to see the results of our hard work in the spring.

We’ve been working on a ground-breaking project to decarbonise the borough by retrofitting water source heat pumps into existing heat networks across the Newington, Consort and Wyndham estates, which will provide over 2,000 properties with a more resilient, efficient, low carbon heat supply.

The Consort and Wyndham estate heat pumps are fully installed, coupled with their buried pipework from the 120m deep bore holes back to the estate’s energy centres. The penultimate installation at Newington estate is due to be complete around March 2022 which will then see all three of the Southwark estates using heat pump technology to provide heat to all the homes connected to the existing networks.

The £24m Manchester Civic Quarter Heat Network (MCQHN) has passed an exciting milestone after it began supplying low-carbon heat to its first customer, the Manchester Central Convention Complex.

Heat is generated in the new Energy Centre, located near Bridgewater Hall, and pumped through district heating pipes to Manchester Central where it now meets the full heating demands of the convention complex.

The heat connections as part of the initial phase of going live include:

• Manchester Art Gallery
• Bridgewater Hall
• Town Hall Extension
• Central library

We love taking the opportunity to meet youngsters to discuss climate change, the work we do to combat it and the various career paths available in the green energy sector. November was a particularly busy month with our staff getting invited to three schools across England and Scotland to deliver climate education talks.

Our Project Director, Hugh Thompson and Proposals Manager, Gemma Dyson travelled to St John’s Primary School in Blackwood, Scotland to meet a group of 20 pupils aged 9-11 and talk about global warming and ways to join the future green workforce.

Richard Houghton returned to Bolton School, where he had previously studied, to address a lunchtime audience of years 10-13 and talk about careers in electrical engineering. Richard talked about studying for a degree, the importance of the right work placements and the work he does now with 3-D models, diagnosing problems and finding ways to solve them.

Our third visit involved Design Director, Operations North & Scotland, Lee Moran, who attended St Bede’s in Lytham, where he spoke at a careers provision event and discussed the wide variety of roles and pathways into the future green workforce.

We’d like to thank all the schools who made our staff feel so welcome and the students for their engagement and enthusiasm.

Vital Energi are growing their offering within the ESCo market after welcoming Paul McIver as their new Community Energy Director, who has a wealth of experience within this area.

Paul will be responsible for developing ESCo opportunities for Vital that will contribute to a low carbon future, and play a pivotal role in the energy transition and net-zero carbon agenda.

Having been instrumental in the successful winning, mobilisation and delivery of several ESCo deals, including the iconic Battersea Power Station, Paul brings experience of negotiating the ESCo as well as knowledge of what the market, business and end user expects from receiving their heat, and in some cases cooling from a district heat network.

A professionally qualified electrical engineer with over 30 years’ experience, of which the last 15 have been held in various managerial positions, Paul has proven abilities in strategic planning, managing projects, improving efficiency of operations, team building and detailing project information to determine effective processes for operations

Paul honed his ESCo knowledge during his time at ENGIE’s East London Energy Olympic Park site, where he was responsible for creating the ENGIE Community Energy brand, and overseeing strategic management and delivery of district energy, residential and community services for ENGIE in the UK.

Paul is also skilled in the technical appraisal of energy projects, through to project delivery, lifecycle maintenance of assets and infrastructure, the provision of financing for such projects and customer satisfaction.

Welcome to the team Paul!

Vital Energi are celebrating after their client, Leeds City Council, claimed two of the top accolades at the 2021 H&V News Awards.

The Leeds PIPES project took top honours in the District Heating Project of the Year and the HVAC Project of the Year (Over £0.5m) categories.

The awards took place at the Hilton, Park Lane, London on Thursday 12^th of November and celebrated the achievements of low-carbon energy projects in the UK, as well as highlighting the innovative products which are set to revolutionise the energy market.

Mike Cooke, Managing Director for Vital Energi commented, “This night was a showcase of the most innovative projects taking place in the UK energy sector.  It was a fantastic celebration of the businesses and the clients who are driving the UK towards meeting their net zero carbon targets.”

“We are delighted that the commitment, vision and investment which Leeds City Council have demonstrated in making the Leeds PIPES project a reality has been recognised with two awards.  The project showcases the speed with which councils and local authorities can create city-wide projects and reduce carbon emissions and will be an inspiration for other public sector bodies looking to follow their lead.”

“We are extremely proud that West Dunbartonshire’s Queens Quay development was highly commended.  This is the UK’s first large-scale water source heat pump, which has already won the European Heat Pump Award, and it will usher in a new age of renewable energy which harnesses the latent heat in the UK’s many water sources.”

Brynwhillach Solar Farm begins exporting zero-carbon electricity to Morriston Hospital as project officially goes live.

The Swansea Bay University Health Board solar farm has reached an exciting milestone after the 10,000 solar panels installed by Vital Energi went live and began exporting electricity to Morriston Hospital.

The installation will generate 4MW of zero-carbon electricity for the hospital and will reduce the Health Board’s carbon emissions by 20,000 tonnes over the lifecycle of the project.

Scott Lutton,  Operations Director – North and Scotland  explains, “This is a very important project for both the Health Board and the NHS in general as it will be the first Welsh hospital to receive its electricity from a dedicated solar farm and in addition to the large carbon savings, the hospital will reduce its energy spend by £439,000 per year.

“As energy security is paramount to the NHS, the solar farm underwent a rigorous testing period and met all the requirements of the local district network operator.  Once it successfully passed these requirements the system went live and is now supplying zero carbon electricity to the hospital.”

Vital Energi have also installed the supporting electrical infrastructure and 3km private wire network which will connect the solar farm to Morriston hospital.

This is the second energy project Vital Energi have delivered for SBUHB after phase 1 saw them deliver a range of energy conservation measures which reduced carbon emissions by 2,476 tonnes per annum whilst generating £870,000 of cost savings per year. Both projects were procured through the RE:FIT framework and come with an energy performance contract which guarantees performance, financial and carbon targets.