This collaborative project between Jaguar Land Rover (JLR) and The University of Warwick seeks to develop flexible digital twin models that will enable novel, integrated solutions to the decarbonisation of heating and cooling on large industrial and commercial sites. The electrification of heating in particular is one of the biggest challenges facing the UK. The move to heat pumps for space heating would require at least a doubling of grid capacity if boilers are directly replaced without any storage considerations. The variability of renewable electricity and the increase in electric vehicles will compound the problem.

Both the University and Jaguar Land Rover may reach the limit of the electrical grid connections to their sites if the transition is not done in an optimal way, an issue that will be prominent in industrial, commercial and residential areas across the country. The models and solutions will be developed in a general way in order to be applicable to other large commercial or industrial sites and aid in the decarbonisation of the UK's heating.

The project is part of the Warwick Industrial Fellowships (WIF) scheme and the associated PhD student will have the opportunity to work closely with JLR engineers at Gaydon and Whitley, with access to sites and energy data. The skills they will develop will be highly sought after both in university research on energy modelling and as a practising engineer in industry. The profitability and sustainability of many companies is now highly dependent on their energy efficiency and so engineers with such energy modelling expertise will be in high demand.