Leeds sustainable regeneration scheme

Background

Yarn Street Leeds also know as H2010,  is a 281 unit residential-led mixed-use regeneration scheme owned by Miller Homes situated on the Hunslet Waterfront in Aire Valley Leeds (AVL).

AVL is designated as one of four ‘Urban Eco-settlements’ (UES) within the Leeds City Region (LCR).  The UES’ represent LCR’s response to the Eco-town Programme which involved a call for sites suitable for development of new sustainable communities.

In late 2008 LCR commissioned a study to identify opportunities to deliver a forerunner demonstration sustainable development under their UES Programme.  LCR was seeking a sustainable development that could be delivered in the short term to provide impetus to the entire UES Programme. 

The study, published in January 2009 identified the H2010 site as one of only two key strategic projects in the City Region that could be developed to the highest sustainable standards if additional public investment could be identified.

Accordingly Yarn Street not only had potential to be a sustainable market creation scheme that would not only result in an uplift in localised values to improve the viability of local schemes, but it offered the opportunity to begin work on a sub-regionally significant UES Programme. 

However, the impact of the economic downturn so adversely affected that viability of the Yarn Street development, that it could not be developed even to the lowest statutory sustainable standards, putting the entire City Region UES Programme on hold.

The Housing Stimulus Programme provided the Homes and Communities Agency (HCA) with the opportunity to get the scheme back on track provided that the priorities of LCR, Leeds City Council and Miller Homes could be aligned.  By combining from the funding from the Stimulus Programmes, the HCA joined with Miller Homes and the Council in bidding for an award under the Low Carbon Infrastructure Fund (LCIF) on the grounds that the LCIF resources could act as a fillip for advancing prospects of receiving new build investment from the Kickstart programme.

The application for LCIF funding was successful and did assist the case for receiving funding under the Kickstart programme.

As a result of collaborative working between Miller Homes, Leeds City Region, Leeds City Council, the Homes & Communities Agency and Vital Energi, the creation of a new waterfront community started on-site at H2010 in November 2009, and Miller Homes was contracted to develop a combined heat and power plant in March 2010.

Project

The project involved linking different public funding streams and contributions with private investment to commence a stalled private-sector development to higher building standards, including the construction of a Combined Heat and Power Plant.

This was made possible by aligning the priorities and objectives of three separate organisations. 

Miller Homes had received planning permission for a residential-led mixed-use market creation scheme but due to the economic downturn were not able to achieve their goal.

Leeds City Council was seeking to encourage the development of the site to higher standards as a forerunner to give impetus to their wider Urban Eco-settlement programme and the Homes and Communities Agency was tasked with investing in stalled schemes under the Housing Pledge programme.

One of the most remarkable achievements of the Project was the efficiency that the Combined Heat and Power (CHP) scheme evolved from concept to contract.  In the experience of CO2Sense, the Region’s renewable and low carbon business support and enabling body, project development of a CHP facility can take up to 3 years.

The H2010 CHP took less than nine months from project conceptualisation to contracted start on site.

Whilst the development of a 281 mixed-use scheme had spent years in development, the concept of a Urban Eco-settlements’ (UES) forerunner was first identified in the Leeds City Region’s Urban Eco-settlement Deliverability Assessment published in January 2009.  (For more information see the reference section of the case study) 

In May 2009 the HCA launched a range of initiatives from the Treasury Housing Stimulus Fund.  Two of these initiatives; the Kickstart Programme and the Low Carbon Infrastructure Fund, provided the opportunity to join together public and private investment in the pursuit of an identified scheme.  Shortly after the launch of the Housing Stimulus Fund, Miller Homes, Leeds City Council and the HCA formed a project group consisting of key representatives from each constituent body to develop a concept for the competition for Low Carbon Infrastructure Funding in order to improve standards and increase the potential for a successful application under Kickstart. After a meeting with the Low Carbon Infrastructure Fund Sounding Board, the proposal for a gas fired CHP plant was decided.

The Combined Heat and Power (CHP) concept was awarded an LCIF allocation of £1.7m in September 2009 and Kickstart funding was contracted in November 2009.  Work on the construction of the first 61 units began immediately due to requirements under the Kickstart contract, so it was not possible to provide the CHP infrastructure to these units. However the network has been designed to allow retrofit in the future.

The Council has let the building contract for the plant to Miller Homes who has now engaged Vital Energi under back to back terms and conditions.  The Council will own the plant up to the point where it becomes operational when ownership will be transferred to the relevant management company or body.

Each of the partners brought their own skills and experience to the negotiating table in developing this project from concept to reality.

Leeds City Council and the Leeds City Region combined to create a new vision for the project allocating it as a forerunner for their UES programme.  The City Council was also able to manage key risks by drawing on their past experiences in seeking to implement low carbon energy solutions.

Miller Homes not only provided the considerable development expertise that arises from delivering new homes for over 75 years but they demonstrated great capacity for compromise, pragmatism and vision.  The technical staff was able to quickly come to grips with the implications of CHP technology despite the fact that this was to be their first ever scheme including a CHP. 

The fact that Miller Homes so quickly adapted and embraced the concept of what was essentially a publically generated vision that built on their existing aim to regenerate a waterfront is to their absolute credit.

The HCA combined their understanding of place making and their capabilities in the regeneration market place with their remit to allocate investment to suitable projects.  The HCA’s investment therefore helped fund the transition from objective to reality.

Once engaged as preferred developer of the CHP plant and network, Vital Energi’s considerable experience in delivering similar schemes was essential in progressing and adapting the design to enable the start on site contract to progress in good time.

Impact

The Combined Heat and Power (CHP) facility will directly provide low carbon heat to 221 new homes at Yarn Street.  The electricity will be fed into the grid and receipts used to subsidise heating bills for residents and the maintenance of the facility and network.

The network has been designed so as to enable retrofitting into Phase One, and this will need to be the subject of a cost benefit analysis once the remaining network is operational.  Furthermore, the network has been extended to site boundaries to enable extensions into the adjoining industrial estate and the Hunslett Mills site which currently has planning permission for some 900 units. 

The network design therefore facilitates extensions to service existing and future developments subject to viability and in doing so potentially contributes to securing a sustainable future for the wider regeneration of the Hunslet Waterfront.

Typically space heating accounts for around two thirds of the annual energy bill in England (Department of Trade and Industry, 2004), so the CHP facility has the potential to provide substantial savings to the future community.  The scheme includes 1 x 100kw gas fired Combined Heat & Power (CHP) unit and 9 x 225Kw Gas Boilers, which at full capacity have the potential to provide all of the space heating and instantaneous hot water requirements for up to 315 dwellings. In addition to this thermal energy the energy centre will have the potential to generate and export around 1.350mWh of electricity to the grid annually.

The decisions on the future maintenance and expansion of the facility will be put into the hands of a future residents association who will engage the services of a management or energy company to operate the plant and manage billing.  This would put the consumer in control of decisions that will have a direct impact on their bills.  For example, if the management or energy company considered that it would be profitable to extend the network to adjoining sites, it could be for the future Yarn Street residents association to weigh up any potential local impacts against possible additional savings in energy bills that might result.

From the perspective of Leeds City Council (LCC) and Leeds City Region (LCR) the start on site coupled with the CHP facility provides genuine and tangible impetus to the UES programme.  The lessons learned can and will be applied to future phases of development the UES programme, particularly those relating to procuring, owning and operating energy projects in new developments.

Lessons Learned

The following shares the secrets behind the success of this project; what worked and what didn’t and things that we could have done better.

Partnership working

The delivery of regeneration projects through partnership working between public agencies and bodies and the private sector is by no means new, however the nature of this partnership did offer insights into successful methods for delivering cross-sector projects. 

Firstly, this ‘partnership’ was never formally established – it was formed out of necessity.  No board was formed to oversee the work of the project team and maximum use was made of existing Council, HCA and Miller delegations and reporting procedures.  The team was made up of individuals with sufficient authority, delegation and influence in their organisations to draw in additional resources where required, whilst having sufficient technical ability to lead detailed negotiations.  In other words this team was fit for purpose – it was constituted of individuals who were able to deliver quality results quickly and effectively.

The pursuit of the shared vision between partners ensured that the project group was able to understand where and when compromise needed to be made in order to achieve the agreed aims.  But the vision – to kick starts an affordable and sustainable new community with efficient energy provision – was never decided or explicitly agreed through workshops or forums.  In this case, Leeds City Council’s strategy of routinely engaging the private sector both formally and informally ensured that the vision was understood before the HCA’s investment programmes where even conceived.  The partners therefore attended their very first project group meeting ready to work towards achieving the vision.

Centralised Energy versus Micro solutions from a Marketing Perspective

When considering options for appropriate technologies at the early stages of the LCIF bidding process, it was interesting that up-front cost issues were not the principal or motivating concern of Miller Homes.  Miller Homes’ main motivation was to build affordable new build homes that would create a great place to live. 

The scheme is seeking to attract a mixed community but is likely to be most attractive to young families and first home buyers.  Miller Homes considered that while this demographic might be attracted to a home with lower energy bills, it might be equally be adverse to taking on the burden of maintaining renewable technology that was attached to the house, such micro-wind turbines, photovoltaic, or mini CHP units.  But the centralised CHP facility can be promoted as reducing the individual maintenance burden on the vendor through replacing traditional boilers with heat exchangers which are owned and maintained by the management company or ESCO, as well as producing lower energy bills.

A model for the future

There are few examples today of instances where a private house builder has voluntarily provided land to the local authority for the provision of a central low carbon energy facility for a new development when not required to do so under planning policy.  Through involvement in this project, Miller Homes has ‘up-skilled’ its in-house technical staff and educated senior staff and board members on the advantages that such schemes could offer.  The intention is that the plant will eventually be owned by the Residents Association who will appoint the management company or ESCO to look after maintenance and billing.  With firm cross-party commitments to achieving improved dwelling emission standards over the coming years, Miller Homes considers this and similar arrangements to be a model for the future.

Good Practice

What we could have done better

Retrofitting a CHP Network into a Home Zone Scheme - The H2010 scheme has been designed to Home Zone principles  and was not designed with the CHP network in mind.  The approved layout had progressed beyond the point where it could be amended so this CHP network design was effectively a retrofit scheme.  The Home Zones in this scheme include narrower streets than is typical in non-Home Zone schemes.  This has resulted in an unexpected challenge for the CHP network design as there is insufficient carriageway width to accommodate the CHP pipes with other services.  Therefore a separate trench network has been necessary which has added cost to the scheme.  This example therefore highlights the importance for designers to consider the network implications of retrofitting renewable technologies and networks into schemes in the design process.

Get the experts on board early – Vital Energi was confirmed as the preferred sub-contractor relatively late on in the process.  This was unavoidable under the circumstances as Miller Homes needed to ensure that they had a reputable sub-contractor who would offer good value for money.  Once Vital Energi was selected as the preferred partner they were able to bring their experience and technical knowledge to the table and help resolve technical issues beyond the gift of the project group.  Therefore under different circumstances it is worthwhile appointing experts as early on in the process as possible.

Stick to the plan - There was a considerable exploratory phase which investigated various options for owning and managing the facility.  Despite investigating various options the project group finally settled on the original strategy but not before delays to fully exploring several other options.  It was of course necessary to fully investigate other options however there were times where the investigation of alternatives diverted the attention of the project group from their initial objectives.  This time would have been better served had we continued to progress our preferred option whilst the investigation of alternatives was taking place.

Reference

Howard Mee, Land and Property Director
Miller Homes
Lapwing House
Peel Avenue
Calder Park
Wakefield
WF2 7UA
Ph 0800 0840 8586
Email: howard.mee@millerhomes.co.uk
Web: http://www.millerhomes.co.uk