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NETWORK / 11 / NOVEMBER 2016 J ust under a year ago, in Paris, world leaders drew up an agreement designed to keep global warming to 2 degrees Celsius. Less than a year later, a er the EU's rati• cation, the agreement came into force, legally binding 195 countries to adopt the world's • rst global climate deal. By contrast, the Kyoto Protocol took eight years to ratify. The conclusion? Climate action is getting serious. And this was just the start – 2016 has been one for the records. For the • rst time in 100 years there have been several periods with no coal on the UK's electricity system, while in Costa Rica, the country ran for over 100 days solely on renewable electricity. But these achievements are in the power sector, and half our energy demand is for heat. If we are to have any chance of meeting our demanding commitments under the international Paris Accord and the UK's 4th and 5th Carbon budgets, work must begin in earnest to decarbonise heat use across the whole economy. Heat is very di' erent from power. In the power sector, most of the investment decisions are made by energy professionals. Vitally, the choices are core business, these companies specialise in Network is the offi cial media partner of Heat 2016. Speakers will come from Ofgem, BEIS, the Committee on Climate Change, TechUK and more. Booking and more information available at www. heatconference.co.uk making power. In heat, the investors are rarely energy experts and, even when they are, energy is not o en core business. Although a distiller relies on heat for the stills, the core business is making whisky, not the production of heat. So, if we are to deliver a low carbon heat economy, we have to engage the user in a way that the power system does not. We need to understand how heat users make the choices they do. The limited uptake of some technologies under the Renewable Heat Incentive has shown that decisions are not based on price alone. The drive for heat decarbonisation coincides with a data and communications revolution. Millions of local computers, in phones and tablets, are processing information through apps to make people's lives easier. Yet heat in homes and businesses remains largely untouched by this revolution; an analogue world with manual temperature controls and little remote system control. If you don't believe me, just go and take a look at the heating controls in your own home! As we look to decarbonise heat, an obvious place to look for solutions would be this digital revolution. As our work and lives become more complex, the decarbonisation of heat cannot add to our problems but must instead give us greater control in our homes and businesses. In fact this control will be centrally important to the energy system as a whole. As models suggest a greater role for electricity in heating and cooling, our ability to manage the generation and use of that heat will have direct consequences for the stability and security of our power supplies. At times of peak power demand in the UK, heat demand is peaking too, and the peak is four to • ve times larger than that of our electricity needs. An uncontrolled electri• cation of heat would simply break the power system. So as I look back to that cold grey Paris day and the incredible ambition that was launched then, I am amazed to note the past decade's dramatic growth of renewable power. But to move forward and deliver the global ambition of Paris, the story of the next decade must be about decarbonising heat. It is in this context that the Heat 2016 conference will meet in London later this month. The conference was started by the Association for Decentralised Energy and the Energy Institute four years ago. It is going to explore how the global ambition is to be converted into local action. How can the data and communications revolution help decarbonise heat and cut waste? Companies like Zipcar, Uber and Airbnb have revolutionised their industries, bringing to market a new world of options and ways of optimising systems. How can we borrow from innovation and best practice in industries like these to bene• t our own? Heat 2016 will not only explore these options but also consider the policy and regulatory framework within which we must work. TIM ROTHERAY CHIEF EXECUTIVE ASSOCIATION FOR DECENTRALISED ENERGY "In the power sector, the choices are core business, these companies specialise in making power. In heat, the investors are rarely energy experts and, even when they are, energy is not often core business." H E AT A N A LO G U E W O R L D I N A D I G I TA L A G E