Exeter City Council is to scrap a £7.3 million scheme to install heat pumps at Riverside Leisure Centre and Royal Albert Memorial Museum because it has identified “significant challenges to delivering within the timeframe, budget and quality parameters required at both sites”.
The decarbonisation scheme was to be be funded with a £6.4 million government grant, to be spent by the end of March next year, and an additional council contribution of £900,000.
The council had spent £550,000 on the project by the end of June 2024, although it says additional costs have yet to accounted for. It says it hopes to recover the money from the government.
The Royal Albert Memorial Museum in Queen Street
The Riverside Leisure Centre and Royal Albert Memorial Museum are the highest carbon-emitting buildings in the city council’s extensive property portfolio.
It secured funding from the Public Sector Decarbonisation Scheme to decarbonise both buildings, by installing air and water source heat pumps, in March last year.
A report to next week’s council executive committee meeting says it has since identified challenges which it says cannot be addressed in time to deliver either project before the deadline imposed by the funding scheme.
It says that the proposed RAMM decarbonisation scheme would cost around £1 million more than budgeted for and faced major challenges resulting of the building’s location.
It also says current National Grid constraints limit the city centre electricity supply to less than would be required to power the proposed heat pumps, and it is expected to take between three and six years for them to be lifted.
The report also says that uncertainty over the remaining lifespan of the metal roof deck at the Riverside Leisure Centre, as well as other risks related to replacing its roof, meant that project costs could significantly exceed the planned budget.
The council says it can neither extend the government grant deadline nor use the first year project funding to explore alternative solutions.
It nevertheless hopes to bid for a future round of Public Sector Decarbonisation Scheme funding to deliver revised decarbonisation projects at both buildings.
