ISH 2019 was simply massive: 20,000 steps per day. But the long walk from the fair entrance to and around the main heating exhibits in the new hall 12 was well worth the exertion.

Having had the time to reflect on the week’s announcements, introductions and unveilings – how accurate were our predictions for the showings of companies involved in high-efficiency gas heating?

Last week experts from Delta-ee’s Gas Heating Service contributed to discussions at key natural gas and fuel cell industry events - 1,000s of miles apart - in the US and Japan. It was a great opportunity to share Delta-ee’s latest research on two continents outside of Europe and sparked some interesting discussion with fellow delegates.

European perspective on decarbonisation and CHP

The introduction of hybrid heat pumps (hybrids) across Europe has progressed a lot more slowly than we thought it would when we first looked at them around 2012.

Essentially, the technology has not received the anticipated push from equipment manufacturers – remaining a portfolio product for most. And, despite generating very good carbon savings against alternatives, they rarely offer customers enough energy bill savings to justify their higher upfront cost (or encourage installers to push them).

As part of our recent European Heat Summit held in Berlin, our Gas Heating Service team hosted a unique invitation-only roundtable to discuss and debate the top issues and opportunities facing suppliers of high efficiency gas heating systems like micro-CHP, fuel cells, and gas-fuelled heat pumps.

We heard from a wide range of speakers, from industry associations like COGEN Europe, to heating industry giants like Baxi and Vaillant, to specialist technology developers like Tennessee’s Stone Mountain Technologies Inc. and Sunfire from nearby Dresden.

I attended the Fuel Cell Expo, part of Japan’s 14^th World Smart Energy Week conference and exhibition in Tokyo, mainly so that I could talk about the situation here in Europe. I presented the findings of a new study led by Delta-ee on business models for the stationary fuel cell market, which was funded by the Fuel Cell and Hydrogen Joint Undertaking.

At the same time, the Expo is the place to go for an update on what’s happening in the world’s most established market for fuel cells and micro-CHP. This post gives some of my key highlights from the fair, which centre on connectivity, competition and commercialisation.

The level of support for micro-CHP under the UK’s feed-in tariff programme was recently decided by the Government. The industry now has a little over two years to make a success of the current incentive. There are a number of companies who could benefit from this certainty, but no obvious choice for who will now look to drive the market.