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Writing energy history: explaining the neglect of CHP/DH in Britain

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 January 2009

S. Russell
S. Russell
Affiliation:
Department of Science and Technology Studies, University of Wollongong, NSW 2522, Australia.
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Extract

It is inherent in the process of producing mechanical and hence electrical energy from a heat engine that much of the energy input is released as relatively low temperature heat. By various techniques it is possible to produce reject heat at a temperature useful for space heating or industrial process heating, giving a much higher overall efficiency of conversion and saving fuel over separate production of electricity and heat. Heat from combined heat and power (CHP) plant, or from another central source, can be piped in the form of hot water or steam to users' premises, in district heating (DH) networks.

Type
Research Article
Information
The British Journal for the History of Science , Volume 26 , Issue 1 , March 1993 , pp. 33 - 54
Copyright
Copyright © British Society for the History of Science 1993

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References

1 On the technics of CHP and DH, see e.g. Diamant, R. M. E. and Kut, D., District Heating and Cooling for Energy Conservation, London, 1981Google Scholar; or Postlethwaite, A. F., ‘Combined heat and power’, in Energy: Present and Future Options (ed. Merrick, D.), London, 1984Google Scholar. Much activity and debate on CHP is also concerned with its application in industry for process heat. This study does not deal with privately installed industrial CHP except where there were policies or actions affecting both.

2 For remarkably prescient contributions, see Thayer, G. L., ‘Utilisation of exhaust steam’, The Electrician (1897), 39, 617Google Scholar; Prentiss, F. H., ‘The distribution of steam from the central station’, The Electrician (1891), 27, 508–9.Google Scholar

3 For international reviews see e.g. International Energy Agency, District Heating and Combined Heat and Power Systems: A Technology Review, Paris, 1983, ch. 8 and apps. 2–10.Google Scholar

4 A full account of the treatment of CHP and DH in Britain, a longer development of the theoretical framework advocated in this paper, and full details of sources, are contained in The Political Shaping of Energy Technology: Combined Heat and Power in Britain, Aston University Ph.D. thesis, 1986, British Library DX73792/87. Only key or representative references are given here. The account finishes abruptly at 1985, when a handful of big city CHP/DH schemes had reached the planning stage and seemed to have some prospect of going ahead. The study is currently being updated to take account of developments since the mid-1980s and to examine the prospects for CHP in the newly restructured electricity supply industry. The study required access to government and electricity industry files not then released; I am grateful to the CEGB, the Electricity Council and the Departments of Environment and Energy for permission to use material from them. The help of many individuals in the study is acknowledged in the thesis; here I should also like to thank John Schuster, Brian Martin, Robert Olby and two anonymous referees for comments on this paper.

5 On technological determinism, see e.g. Mackenzie, D. and Wajcman, J., ‘Introductory essay’, in The Social Shaping of Technology, Milton Keynes, 1985.Google Scholar

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19 This account is based on files from the POWE, HLG and DSIR series, from BEA/CEA and local government records, as well as published reports and press items.

20 Russell, , op. cit. (4), app. 4.Google Scholar

21 Stevenage, Newton Aycliffe, Hemel Hempstead, Harlow, Glenrothes and East Kilbride.

22 Especially the London County Council (General Powers) Bill of 1946–47. The Local Acts are listed in Russell, , op. cit. (4), app. 5.Google Scholar

23 The committee's work was finished in 1948. Government records give no clue as to why the report was not released for over four years. DSIR files; DSIR, Interim Memorandum on District Heating, London, 1946Google Scholar; Ministry of Works, District Heating, Report by the Heating & Ventilation (Reconstruction) Committee of the Building Research Board of the DSIR, London, 1953.

24 Internal and interdepartmental correspondence in POWE and HLG series files.

25 HLG series files.

26 BEA/CEA and POWE, HLG series files.

27 Electricity Act 1947, s. 50.

28 Report of the Committee on National Policy for the Use of Fuel and Power Resources, Cmd. 8647, London, 1952Google Scholar; POWE series files.

29 BEA/CEA files; POWE series files.

30 ‘District heating in Whitehall’, Heating & Ventilating Engineer (1952), 26, 223–30.Google Scholar

31 Egerton, A., Note, in Ministry of Works, op. cit. (23), p. iv.Google Scholar

32 CEGB and Westminster City Council records.

33 This account relies on CEGB records, news items and articles from Heating & Ventilating Engineer, Municipal Journal, Solid Fuel and other journals, District Heating Association and other conference proceedings, and interviews.

34 Ministry of Power, Fuel for the Future, London, 1967Google Scholar; see also Ministry of Power, Fuel Policy, London, 1965Google Scholar; Cook, P. L. and Surrey, A. J., Energy Policy: Strategies for Uncertainty, London, 1977.Google Scholar

35 Cook, and Surrey, , op. cit. (34), 23–6.Google Scholar

36 See e.g. Roper, H., ‘The development of heat management in this country’, paper to the District Heating Association South Wales and South West Branch conference, Heating for the Community, Bristol, 09 1969.Google Scholar

37 See e.g. Haseler, A. E., ‘District heating’, Municipal Journal (1970), 1715–16Google Scholar. A major drawback remained till the mid-1980s, however: the lack of a cheap, accurate heat meter. Thus flat-rate charging stayed in common use.

38 Local Government (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 1976.

39 E.g. Rowe, W. G. E., ‘The Nottingham combined refuse and district heating scheme: a review of its development’, paper to the District Heating Association 3rd National Conference, A National Plan for Heat, 04 1979Google Scholar; ‘District heating for Billingham town centre’, Surveyor (1964), 123, 11 04, 53–5.Google Scholar

40 One survey has identified over 400 non-military schemes of over 0.3 megawatts, and estimates that 1.5–2 per cent of the UK's 20 million dwellings are on district or group heating, nearly 100,000 of these in London. Orchard Partners, Present State and Future Development of the Heat Market in Member States: District Heating in the UK, 266/1/R1, London, 1983.Google Scholar

41 E.g. GLC Economic Policy Group, The Energy Economy, Strategy Document 5, 05 1983, 24–5Google Scholar; Crewe, A., ‘District heating: a political football bounces back’, Energy in Buildings (1986), 03, 20–1.Google Scholar

42 Ryding, H., ‘Alternative appraisal’, Building Services (1982), 4, 10, 35–7.Google Scholar

43 CEGB, Peterborough Development Corporation & Eastern Electricity Board, Peterborough: District Heating for Castor, London, 1976Google Scholar; CEGB, Central London District Heating Scheme, London, 1977Google Scholar. The South of Scotland Electricity Board published the Central Glasgow District Heating Study April 1975–March 1976, Glasgow, 1976.Google Scholar

44 See e.g. correspondence and papers, in Select Committee on Energy, Minutes of Evidence, 24 11 1981, HC 60–i.Google Scholar

45 Hartley, P. P., ‘London Electricity's 100 MW heat distribution scheme’, Electrical Times (1972), 162, 16 03, 52–4; CEGB files.Google Scholar

46 CPRS, Energy Conservation, London, 1974, 6.Google Scholar

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48 Atkins, W. S. & Partners, , C.H.P. Feasibility Programme Interim Report, London, 12 1980Google Scholar; Department of Energy and Atkins, W. S., Combined Heat and Power District Heating Feasibility Programme, Energy Paper 53, London, 1984Google Scholar; Millbank, P., ‘Cities jostle for heat and power cash’, Electrical Review (1984), 215, 24/31 08, 5.Google Scholar

49 Survey in Russell, , op. cit. (4), app. 7.Google Scholar

50 Select Committee on Energy, Third Report, 1982/3, Combined Heat and Power, 2 vols., HC 314–1 & -2, London, 1983.Google Scholar

51 See documents produced by Newcastle and Sheffield local authorities, e.g. City of Newcastle upon Tyne, Gateshead MBC & Tyne & Wear CC, ‘Submission to the Department of Energy’, November 1982Google Scholar; Lawrence, D., ‘Developing a C.H.P. scheme in a local authority area’, paper to IEE Conference, Energy Options, London, 04 1984, 280–4.Google Scholar

51 E.g. Select Committee, op. cit. (50), HC314–1, pp. 36–8, 41.Google Scholar

53 See e.g. Rufford, G., ‘Small scale combined heat and power systems’, Heating & Ventilating Engineer (1986), 59 (675), 10–13, and (676), 20–4.Google Scholar

54 See e.g. Dart, J. F. and Talbot, J. W., ‘The C.E.G.B.'s role in C.H.P. development’, Atom (1985), (342), 9–14Google Scholar; CEGB, Combined Heat and Power at Six English Cities, London, 1983.Google Scholar

55 Lucas has analysed the differences in the optimal level of CHP which comes from these different frameworks: Lucas, N. J. D., ‘The national case for local production of heat and power in parallel with the public supply of electricity’, Applied Energy (1976), 2, 07, 225–36CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Lucas, , ‘The case for combined heat and power in the UK’, Energy Research (1978), 2, 29–42.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

56 Department of Energy, The Structure of the Electricity Supply Industry in England and Wales: Report on the Committee of Inquiry, Cmnd. 6388, London, 1976Google Scholar; Department of Energy, Reorganisation of the Electricity Supply Industry in England and Wales, Cmnd. 7134, London, 1979Google Scholar; Select Committee on the Nationalised Industries, Ninth Report 1977/8, Reorganising the ESI: Pre-Legislative Hearings, HC 636, London, 1978.Google Scholar

57 Macadam, J., ‘The development of combined heat and power with district heating in London’, Sizewell Inquiry Proof of Evidence GLC/P2.Google Scholar

58 Particularly at Newcastle and Sheffield.

59 At the same time, there has been a substantial revival of interest in CHP for industrial and institutional use.

60 Pervasive contradictions and unintended consequences of actions, of course, ensure that this correspondence is by no means simple and consistent.

61 E.g. Latour, B., ‘The Prince for machines as well as machinations’, in Technology and Social Process (ed. Elliott, B.), Edinburgh, 1988, 20–43Google Scholar; Law, J., ‘The anatomy of a sociotechnical struggle: the design of the TSR2’Google Scholar, in ibid., 44–69; Callon, M., ‘The state and technical innovation: a case study of the electric vehicle in France’, Research Policy (1980), 9, 358–76.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

62 E.g. Callon and Law ‘reject macro-determinism and with this any form of large scale social (or technological) determinism’. Callon, M. and Law, J., ‘Economic markets and scientific innovation: notes on the construction of socio-technical networks’, unpublished paper, 03 1987Google Scholar. Law argues that ‘the distinction between macro- and micro-sociology’ simply reflects ‘differences in scale’. These ‘should be seen as the outcome of differentially effective attempts… to impose versions of scientific and social reality’. Law, op. cit. (61), 1 and 5. See also Callon, M. and Latour, B., ‘Unscrewing the big Leviathan: how actors macro-structure reality and how sociologists help them to do so’, in Advances in Social Theory and Methodology (ed. Knorr-Cetina, K. and Cicourel, A.), Boston, 1981, 277–303.Google Scholar

63 Law, , op. cit. (61).Google Scholar

64 See, e.g. Callon's generalizations about the ‘powerlessness’ of the state: Callon, , op. cit. (61).Google Scholar

65 A second approach in the ‘new sociology of technology’ literature stresses the social construction of the meanings attached by different social groups to technological artefacts, and the processes by which specific interpretations become dominant. This analysis also has an emphasis on local interactions, and likewise attempts to build up a wider picture by extending the network of connections between groups on the same level. Though its protagonists do not make the same declarations of an ‘agnostic’ stance towards accounts of the wider context, and acknowledge the need to relate the detail of negotiations to broader social structures, I have argued elsewhere that their method in practice leaves them ill-equipped to do so. Pinch, T. and Bijker, W., ‘The social construction of facts and artefacts; or how the sociology of science and the sociology of technology might benefit each other’, Social Studies of Science (1984), 14, 399–41CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Russell, S., ‘The social construction of artefacts: a response to Pinch and Bijker’, Social Studies of Science (1986), 16, 331–46CrossRefGoogle Scholar. On the new sociology of technology approaches in general see Russell, S. and Williams, R., ‘Opening the black box and closing it behind you: on micro-sociology in the social analysis of technology’, paper to British Sociological Association conference, Science, Technology and Society, Leeds, 04 1987Google Scholar. This paper, however, does not adequately distinguish between the different strands of the literature. See also Russell, S., ‘Interests and the shaping of technology: an unresolved debate reappears’, paper to the Australasian Association for the History, Philosophy and Social Studies of Science Conference, Robertson, NSW, 09 1989Google Scholar, reproduced as University of Wollongong Science and Technology Analysis Research Programme Working Paper no. 4, April 1991. The recent work of Donald Mackenzie has more successfully blended the insights of these approaches with analyses at a macro level, relating both the machinations of actors and the social negotiation of technical knowledge to a broader structural account of the context in which they took place.

66 Offe, C., ‘Structural problems of the capitalist state’, in German Political Studies I (ed. von Beyme, K.), London, 1974, 36–7.Google Scholar