Let's get going: overcoming the complex – and often competing – demands of net zero

Despite his career starting out in coal fired power generation, Mike Wake is absolute in his belief that fossil fuels will play no major role in mainstream heating and cooling in the future.

“Two things will happen over the next five or ten years,” says the man responsible for more than 70 district heating sites around the UK – and the 50,000 customers who rely on them for heating and hot water.

“Certainly, everything we build will be on the green end of the spectrum. Today a gas fired CHP – which was the mainstay of some of our solutions even five years ago – is never on the discussion board for clients today.”

Born in Singapore to ex-pat parents in the Far East, Mike now leads a team of more than 500 people in roles ranging from construction and engineering to customer service and political engagement.

It is his team – within E.ON’s specialist Energy Infrastructure Solutions division – that are building, operating and maintaining low carbon energy generation and distribution projects nationwide; from biomass plants and solar arrays in Scotland and Yorkshire to district heating schemes and industrial batteries across London and as far afield as Southampton, Exeter and Newcastle.

Returning to the UK as a student at Loughborough, Mike was among the first intake of a new, more rounded, engineering degree designed to meet the needs of British industry, with sponsor companies including the Central Electricity Generating Board, Hawker-Siddeley aircraft and Midlands Electricity among the participants.

Mike joined Powergen in 1991 after university and at the start of privatisation of the power generation industry where his first role was at the Ratcliffe-on-Soar coal-fired power station (which closed recently as the UK’s last remaining coal fired power station). His first job was in the efficiency department “to make the whole process as efficient as possible to produce as much power as possible for as long as possible . . . to keep the lights on.”

As E.ON’s chief engineer, it’s almost obvious that Mike would focus on some of those technical challenges – and solutions – to meeting net zero targets. But he is also keen to point out the need to manage relationships with a huge variety of customer groups, and meeting their sometimes competing demands.

“It’s different depending on who they are,” he says. “We work with housing developers and then we've got places like NHS Trusts, or city councils like Coventry or Sheffield. They all have different starting points and they all have different ambitions, timescales and they all have different reasons.

“Decarbonising energy is at times complex, with multiple stakeholders being engaged with sometimes conflicting priorities. My role is to lead a team which steers customers through this complexity so they can achieve their energy and decarbonisation needs. 

“Because even in the area of developers there are differences. With Lendlease, our partners in the Silvertown development where we're building a fifth generation heat network, we are stretching the boundaries of innovation and going way above the Greater London Authority requirements for carbon.”

It is in the field of decarbonising whole communities, even whole cities, where Mike can see the most immediate impact of new technology, specifically in moving away from fossil fuelled energy sources such as gas boilers or larger combined heat and power plants, towards renewable energy, even capturing ’waste’ energy sources for use in other areas.

The challenge there is that while cities have the political will to decarbonise as they don’t always have enough of the knowledge, the people, or the capital to deliver on those ambitions. “They’re also very cautious because it's public money,” Mike adds. “After all, it’s yours and my council tax they’re spending.”

The challenges vary on location, ambition and what energy sources are already available. “Do they start with transport or heat? Or do they start with large buildings and solar, and the question then is how do they get their clients in their cities to decarbonise and how do they support that as well as leading the way with their own buildings?”

One challenge occupying local authorities is the growing role of heat networks to decarbonise significant sections of cities, mandating the connection of key industrial producers of heat – refrigeration, data centres etc – for use elsewhere such as across whole housing developments. 

Heat zoning, says Mike, is a “massive opportunity” with benefits far beyond from air quality and net zero ambitions. The 3% of heat demand currently fed by heat networks should grow to up to 20% by 2050, taking the number of residential properties from 500,000 today (of which E.ON has more than 50,000) up to five million properties.

Heat zoning will create tens of thousands of new green collar jobs over many decades, either for newcomers to the job market or those currently in in the gas sector looking to transfer their skills. 

Across the country, industry investment needs to go from £300 million a year to more than £3 billion. It’s that sense of scale – and the speed of delivery needed – which are the real challenges, Mike acknowledges. “Is it possible? Anything is possible with the right government will and people getting on and doing it. We are in an excellent place to be part of that revolution, and we've got an excellent track record of delivery of existing heat networks.

“We talk frequently about Malmo in Sweden because of its scale. It’s one city but 90% of its population is on the heat network. 90%. That's taken them decades to get to – it’s achievable if you set your mind to it.

“Can we do it? Yes. But we need to get going.”