Infrastructure Cost Calculator

• The Infrastructure Cost Calculator was developed to allow users to calculate and compare network transition costs across a number of scenarios and vectors, including electricity, gas, heat and hydrogen
• The Infrastructure Cost Calculator provided users with access to a robust, centrally stored database of infrastructure costs based on current industry data
• Users could define and compare different scenarios to understand long term investments for a UK transition to a low carbon energy network. In order to assess the opportunities for meeting long term emissions reductions targets, it was necessary to understand the costs and performance of the energy infrastructure that would carry energy from where it is generated, to where it is consumed.

This £600,000 research project was led by international consulting engineers Buro Happold, and provided users with data on the costs and performance associated with key types of fixed energy infrastructure.

Example capabilities of the Infrastructure Cost Calculator include:

• Impact Analysis: testing new innovations to understand how they impact on the cost of networks.

• Sensitivity Analysis: investigating how cost changes based on future scenarios impact upon lifetime network costs.

• Transition comparisons: investigating the difference between the costs of pathways to reach a low carbon energy network.

• Time implications: analysing the financial impacts of carrying out infrastructure changes over different time periods.