A scientist specialising in energy planning has recommended that home heating be managed centrally by the state or an approved power provider, rather than by individuals, in a bid to improve sustainability and better utilise the energy available.

Professor Poul Alberg Østergaard of the Department of Development and Planning at Aalborg University, Denmark, made the recommendations as part of a wider plan for the country’s energy, which included electric cars for all and a ban on wood-powered stoves and boilers in homes.

“If we can, ideally we must go in and control when heat pumps are running in individual households,” explained Østergaard.

“For example, instead of running with a fixed temperature of 21 degrees [Celsius], turn the heat up to 23 degrees if there is a storm on the way so that you use the houses as a kind of heat storage.”

Although fairly radical suggestions, Østergaard said that the proposals would boost Denmark’s sustainability credentials, as it would greatly improve how energy was used, and preserve less sustainable energy sources, such as biofuels, for industries where they are essential.

Central to Østergaard’s proposals was a focus on restructuring existing energy networks to avoid the current fragmentation and individual controls that allow energy to be wasted.

“We need to design more complex systems, and we must see them as connected,” he said.

“The heating system is linked to the power system, and so are cars. We must have optimization across energy sectors. This is what the future energy structure looks like.”

By centralising energy management, Østergaard argued that power production and usage could be far better managed to suit sustainable sources such as wind turbines.

“By using electricity for both heating homes and passenger transport, we have much greater potential electricity consumption to operate with,” he said.

“That gives us more control options. There is much more opportunity to use a lot of power when the wind is blowing and to decrease consumption when there is no wind.”

While the proposals seem radical, Østergaard sees them being gradually implemented, but warned of the importance of planning now for changes that may not occur for many years.

“This is an ultimate goal we’re moving towards. We won’t necessarily get there in big steps, but this is the trend. It’s a big change, but it’s not something that’s going to happen today or tomorrow,” he said.

“On the other hand, it means of course that the decisions we make today must not prevent us from going down that path later. So this has a great deal of significance for the investments we are making today; things are connected.”

In particular, he argued that such a plan should be used to inform future power infrastructure decisions.

“Electric cars are smart because they are much more energy efficient than petrol cars. But this assumes that the power we use in electric cars comes from something other than a coal-fired power plant,” said Østergaard.

“Things go hand in hand. As more electric cars become more prevalent, we also need power generation that can match them and that is environmentally friendly.”