‘Google Maps of heat loss’ | E.ON and Coventry City Council launch drone scans with tech startup Kestrix to drive warmer homes at scale

The Strategic Energy Partnership between E.ON and Coventry City Council is working with tech startup Kestrix to use thermal camera drones and advanced 3D heat loss modelling at scale, providing real-world data on the performance of thousands of homes in Coventry at once. This will allow better – and faster – targeting of energy efficiency improvements with the aim of making homes more energy efficient and, ultimately, cheaper to heat.  

Described as the ‘Google Maps of heat loss’, Kestrix uses drones equipped with thermal imaging cameras to scan a bird’s-eye view of homes from about 50 metres high, quantifying precisely how and where heat escapes from buildings. The drone survey takes a few minutes rather than the current model of home visits which can typically last hours.

The 3D heat loss models highlight opportunities for building improvements at scale, with machine learning insights recommending what improvements could work best and at lowest cost.

The new solutions give a far clearer picture of how much it costs to run a house and how to fix heat loss issues. Capturing this data at scale gives a clear blueprint of which homes are performing the worst across whole areas, meaning energy efficiency improvements can be targeted to those who need it most in a more efficient way.

The data captured could also help social landlords and local authorities to plan and prioritise the work and, over time, aspire to build up a map of heat losses community-wide.

The collaboration between E.ON and Kestrix grew out of the Free Electrons open innovation programme, in which E.ON and other leading global utilities work together with promising start-ups to develop innovative solutions for the world of new energy. As a finalist in the 2024 edition of Free Electrons, Kestrix was brought into the organisation by E.ON Group Innovation, E.ON's incubator for innovative technologies. Through Free Electrons, E.ON Group Innovation has helped launch a number of pilot projects across Europe, with Kestrix being the latest. 

Vijay Tank, Chief Operating Officer at E.ON Infrastructure Solutions, said: “At E.ON we have improved hundreds of thousands of homes going back many years, but if the UK is to meet its net zero targets we are going to need to improve 1.8 homes every minute from now to 2050.

“We need to go further and faster, and that’s where our relationship with Kestrix and our Strategic Energy Partnership with the City of Coventry come in. Bringing together the city and this cutting-edge technology means we can deliver accurate data at scale and take away any guesswork in where exactly are the worst performing homes and what help we can get to those who need it most.”

Councillor Jim O’Boyle, cabinet member for jobs, regeneration and climate change, said: “This new technological innovation will allow E.ON, our strategic energy partner, to assess heat loss from homes at scale and get vital data on where and how we can encourage or support local people to make improvements – in turn saving them cash on their heating bills.  It will also mean that some people who might not qualify for support will be able to have a look at the data for their home in case there is action they want to take.”

Lucy Lyons, co-founder of Kestrix, added: “There is no scalable, cost-effective way of knowing reliably how heat is lost across the millions of buildings we all live, work and play in – let alone how to fix it and how much fixes will cost. We need to upgrade millions of homes across the UK and with scarce finance, time and resources it’s critical to put insulation where it’s needed – with partners like E.ON and Coventry City Council we have the ambition and scale to make a real difference in people’s lives.”

The Coventry trial is the largest scale application of the Kestrix system in the world, and the drone thermal imaging will analyse more than 4,000 homes, centred on the Hillfields area in the east of the city.

Details on project rollout:

• Drone flights are scheduled to begin from mid-February, after local people have been notified by letter.
• The community-scale data is treated with machine learning and computer vision algorithms to quantify heat loss and prescribe retrofit roadmaps for individual homes
• Once the project team has reviewed the data, the project team will contact residents to discuss any options for making their home more energy efficient.
• Reports may also include options for residents to access funding streams for support with home improvements.