Local Electricity Supply: Opportunities, archetypes and outcomes

This report investigates how new, system-wide value opportunities have arisen in the energy system and how local electricity1 business models can capture them. The research team was composed of Dr Stephen Hall and Dr Katy Roelich of the Schools of Environment and Civil Engineering at the University of Leeds. This report develops a detailed evidence base to explore the business models and value opportunities offered by the emerging field of local electricity supply. The purpose of this report is to offer evidence-based options for enabling the local electricity supply sector in the UK

Briefing: Resource scarcity and resource security – a suppressed civil engineering challenge

While natural and manufactured resources provide the raw materials with which civil engineers work, the term ‘resources’ should always be considered in its wider interpretation and then in the context that resources are in many cases limited. That they should be used wisely (resource efficiency) is beyond contention – we do this as a matter of course – yet considerations of where and how resources are obtained and refined for use are far less likely to feature in a civil engineer's psyche. Similarly, considerations of resource availability for others now, and importantly in the future, and the vulnerability of these resources to future supply disruption (e.g. for geopolitical reasons) are likely not to be in the forefront of our thinking when conducting our routine business. The ICE Research, Development & Innovation towards Engineering Excellence panel has chosen this topic as one of pressing importance across all the sectors that comprise civil engineering. Accordingly, the panel is promoting this topic for Research & Development Enabling Fund (R&DEF) proposals. This briefing note describes the prior work of the panel in exploring the extent of this issue, along with insights from current research, to raise awareness, encourage R&DEF proposals and prime debates on this topic

Efficient and service oriented infrastructure operation: the role of the Energy Efficiency Directive in driving change towards Multi Utility Service Companies

Infrastructure operation can be described as separate utility systems provisioning unconstrained demand, with higher throughput corresponding to higher profits. In contrast, an efficiency perspective would prioritize coordinated infrastructure operation focused on essential service delivery at the lowest possible resource use. We investigate how to accelerate the adoption of alternative infrastructure operation configurations which are: centred on the end-user and their demand for services; concerned with resource efficiency improvements; and consider multiple infrastructure streams. We call these alternative modes of operation Multi-Utility Service Companies (MUSCos). Market and system failures, that arise in privatised utility systems, present barriers to the adoption of MUSCos. This paper categorises these barriers and investigates the extent to which the Energy Efficiency Directive (EED) overcomes them. The EED is analysed because energy is required to deliver the majority of household infrastructure services and as a result energy policy will have influence over the related infrastructure systems. Our research finds that the EED could increase adoption of service-oriented contracts in the public sector, potentially resulting in spillover to the domestic and commercial sector. However, without changes to accounting practices, financial instruments and standardisation of contracts, investment risks and transaction costs would remain high and it is unlikely that this spillover would occur. In addition, the continued fragmentation of policy and cross-sector information asymmetries augments existing barriers to more integrated infrastructure operation. We describe additional measures that might overcome these weaknesses; including measures to reduce contractual barriers and risks in the domestic sector, provide more appropriate financing and accounting arrangements and more explicitly address the interconnectivity of infrastructure systems in future policy