PlanningBlog – Brodies LLP

District heating networks, common in places like Denmark and the central European countries, are still rare in Scotland (there are successful examples in Aberdeen and Lerwick), although heating and hot water represents half of all energy consumed by Scottish households. Although not suitable everywhere, the fitting of district heating in our towns is key to achieving the Scottish target of 11% of heat consumed in Scotland coming from renewable sources by 2020 (which is eight times the current rate). See for instance the visionary Sustainable Glasgow Initiative which proposes envisages the creation of substantial district heating schemes in Glasgow. My colleague Charles Smith has written elsewhere about the new financial and policy incentives encouraging installation of district heat. But is the planning environment sufficiently encouraging?

The Department of Communities and Local Government is presently consulting on a new PPS for England: Planning for a Low Carbon Future in a Changing Climate. The draft includes policies to back the development of renewable heat. There is a requirement to identify opportunities for decentralised energy supply during the development planning process, including a specific requirement for heat mapping (see London example), and a requirement that the suitability of sites should be assessed for potential to contribute to heat demand where a heat network exists or could be provided. This means that heat sources and heat users in proximity can be identified – and so can opportunities for one to supply heat to the other. Furthermore, the new policy indicates that planning authorities should expect developers in areas where there is an existing decentralised power supply system to connect into it.

Although there is plenty of generally encouraging national Scottish policy on district heat, there is no Scottish equivalent yet to this PPS giving such a specific policy lead. In order to support district heating, detailed planning policies of the sort proposed in the draft English PPS are going to be needed.  Now that national planning policy is to be kept to a minimum, the lead on policies to encourage district heating will need to come from the development plans. In the absence of specific policy or guidance from the Scottish Government, the development planners might consider using the draft English policies as their model.