Combined Heat & Power (CHP)

Combined Heat & Power (CHP) is a process which involves the simultaneous generation of heat and electricity. The heat recovered is used to provide heating or cooling to the building. CHP is effectively a small scale power station which offers savings by generating local electricity and recovering useful heat during the generation process.

Conventional electricity generation wastes a great deal of heat. The CHP plant can achieve far higher levels of efficiency by generating electricity and recovering the heat. The ratio of electricity to heat output depends on the type of plant and the fuels being utilised which typically ranges from 1:1 for diesel engineered CHP plant to 1:3 for some gas fired CHP plant.

Assessing the suitability of a CHP plant will depend on the demand requirements for heating and electricity and the profile of this demand.

Generally CHP is particularly suited to applications where the demand is for buildings with longer occupation times, such as hotels, hospitals etc… The commercial viability is also affected by the fluctuations in fuel prices and the market price of electricity.