Discover the achievements of the 2014-2020 NPA projects

Seven years of cooperation between people, communities, and organisations across thousands of kilometres made a difference in the Northern Periphery and Arctic regions.

Browse the NPA map of results to discover our stories of cooperation. Pick a dot from the map and scroll down to read  about people who have met similar minded colleagues and together found solutions for their shared challenges.

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Warming up remote households

Turning locally sourced biomass into heat and electricity

In the Western Isles, the weather is cool and windy all year round. Due to strong winds, the area is often suffering from electricity outages. Houses in this area are old and regarded as “hard to heat” because of their energy inefficiency. H-CHP project tested how CHP method (Combined Heat and Power) can both provide heating and generate electricity for rural households. To test the suitability of this method in remote areas, a micro-CHP system was installed in Blackhouse, Isle of Lewis. Fueled by a solid renewable biomass (in this case dry wood, but other fuels could be wood chips, pellets, straw chips, peat, and others), the system succeeded in producing both heat and electricity. During the testing the team found out that dry wood produces the highest amount of electricity, compared with coal or peat.

The project prepared a Community guide for communities interested in HCP, together with a Guide for users explaining how to combine HCP with other household systems, or a Report of CHP related regulations across the Northern Periphery and Arctic. These and other resources are also included in the Toolkit.

Copyright of images: H-CHP project

 

Muriel Macleod

private

After burning peat in the Blackhouse stove, we saw a big improvement in the performance when the biomass CHP system was installed last year with far more efficient heating, and we are happy the fuel we use is renewable and causes no environmental harm. The system also generates electricity along with the heat meaning we are now unaffected by the power cuts that frequently happen in winter on Lewis. The system is good and will likely be widely adopted once the price drops.