Projects
Commercial Vehicle Fleet – Development of Total Cost of Operation Model
Decarbonisation of UK transport and the related Zero Emission Vehicle (ZEV) mandate requires companies to transition their commercial vehicle fleets to Battery Electric Vehicles (BEV) or alternative new emerging technologies (e.g. FCEC). As an operational utility network with responsibility for public safety WWU’s fleet undergoes a more challenging and varied range of duty cycles than most commercial fleets includes vehicles that are required to provide on-site power and must be capable of meeting WWU’s statutory duty to respond quickly to Public Reported Escapes.
Within this challenging operational context WWU must deliver a fleet transition at the lowest feasible cost to assure value for money for our customers. This is further complicated by the need to plan the fleet transition while the associated technological and policy landscape continues to evolve in parallel. Although the learnings generated from the project will be specific to WWU’s fleet as a case study they will be applicable to any networks with an operational fleet.
To assure a cost-effective transition and derisk future operations WWU require a Total Cost of Operation (TCO) model. This will be specifically targeted at our particular operational context capable of assessing the costs and capabilities of a range of ZEV options and crucially must be easy for staff to adopt for internal use and update in the future as new data and/or technologies become available.
The purpose of this project is to provide WWU with a TCO model that addresses our specific operational requirements ensuring that plans and investment decisions will be grounded in real-world technology assessments and our operational fleet data.
Biomethane feedstock deliverability
Cadent have been working with The Green Gas Taskforce to commission a series of reports that examine the benefits of greater biomethane generation to Great Britain’s energy system as well as the economic benefits that such volumes of green gas could provide. Work conducted by Alder BioInsights in their “Green Gas Future” report concluded that biomethane volumes of 120 TWh are possible in the UK by 2050 based on technical potential of UK feedstocks.
This project seeks to explore the operational emissions market and developmental implications of meeting the potential volumes published by Alder BioInsights (120 TWh pa by 2050) as well as the implications of meeting the NESO FES 25 Holistic Transition scenario relating to the production of biomethane in the UK (36 TWh per annum by 2035 and 64 TWh per annum by 2050).
The conclusions of this project will be published in a public report entitled “Delivering Green Gas” that:
- Outlines the viability benefits and key questions behind the integration of the UK’s agricultural supply chain AD industry and gas distribution networks.
- Highlights where they may be trade-offs or unintended consequences introduced by scaling feedstock production for biomethane and if there are ways that these can be addressed to mitigate the impact.
- Defines concrete actions that need to be taken in the agricultural sector by agricultural policy makers and others to unlock the feedstock volumes set out in the Alder BioInsights work and the NESO scenarios where this is appropriate and doesn’t introduce undesirable consequences.
- Sets out the broader economic and environmental benefits that could be provided in delivering these volumes of biomethane beyond the energy sector and particularly to the UK’s agricultural sector.
Calorific Gas Sensor
The UK and Irish gas networks are undergoing a major transition to support the integration of green gases including biomethane and hydrogen. A significant challenge is the inability of the current gas billing infrastructure based on flow-weighted average calorific value (CV) measurements taken at National Transmission System (NTS) offtakes to accurately reflect the gas composition received by consumers—particularly with the increasing number of decentralised injection points. This discrepancy presents a technical and regulatory hurdle to achieving fair and transparent billing.
This programme is leveraging 3 suppliers to develop a range of novel calorific value sensors that will enable calorific value to be accurately measured at different points on the network without the need for venting.
The programme comprises of 3 individual projects which will develop each suppliers’ technology up to a sufficiently high TRL where the sensors are ready to be trialled in the field. Each supplier will be delivering their own scope of work but will be expected to share a reasonable amount of information with each other in order to ensure maximum value is obtained from this programme. The innovators will not be expected to disclose any information that could provide them with a competitive advantage over the other solutions
INNOVATIVE MONITORING AND CONTROL OF PIPELINE CONSTRUCTION
Cadent proposes to trial “Digital Inspector” (DI) an innovative platform that enhances real-time control inspection and recording of pipeline construction activities. Digital Inspector provides verifiable evidence of weld quality supervises critical parameters live during construction and generates a complete digital record for asset integrity.
This project will trial Digital Inspector across multiple Cadent construction projects in 2025/26 working closely with Cadent’s contractors to assess practical usability contractor acceptance and the impact on existing BAU processes.
Greenhouse Gas Removals
This project will assess the potential for biomethane production to deliver Greenhouse Gas Removals (GGRs) through the capture transport and permanent storage of biogenic CO₂ released during biogas upgrading and through the utilisation of biomethane at facilities equipped with carbon capture.
The work will establish the potential scale and economics of biomethane-derived GGRs in the UK assess opportunities to integrate biomethane with the developing UK Carbon Capture Utilisation and Storage (CCUS) sector and identify policy and commercial barriers currently limiting deployment.
The project will provide evidence to support the Green Gas Taskforce in demonstrating the potential contribution of green gases to the UK’s transition to Net Zero and informing future development of the GGR policy and business model framework.
RIVAN Synthetic Gas – Review of RIVAN RNG Process
A technical review study assessing the design and operational performance of a novel renewable natural gas process including its integration with variable renewable energy sources to inform suitability for grid injection and support future deployment and strategic decision-making within a low carbon energy system.
Plastic to Gas (CART) Feasibility Study
The project will deliver an integrated feasibility assessment of Carbon Recycling Technology (CART) combining laboratory validation independent technical due diligence and commercial analysis into a single unified decision framework.
The objective is to determine whether CART can be progressed to demonstrator projects and ultimately commercialised as a low-carbon gas-to-grid solution for waste plastics and develop technology from TRL 2 to TRL 5.
The project is to run for approximately 4 months and will establish baseline scalability of synthesis and grid injection of waste-derived synthetic natural gas (SNG). This will enable the creation of a strong evidence-based bid to pursue SIF funding to design and build a pilot scale CART demonstrator in future development stages.
Risk Assessment Methodologies for Pipelines & AGIs 2026-2027
The UK’s high pressure gas transmission and distribution networks-which comprise of buried pipelines and above ground installations (AGIs) pose potential major safety hazards in the rare event of gas release. Effectively managing these risks is challenging due to several interrelated issues such as outdated or fragmented risk assessment methodologies where existing tools and methodologies need to be continuously updated to reflect regulatory and standards change. Individual gas network operators do not experience enough major incidents to statistically derive meaningful failure frequencies. This limits their confidence in risk estimates unless data is pooled and collectively analysed across the industry. Risks vary significantly between diverse asset types and a consistent integrated methodology is hence needed to address this complexity.
National Gas Transmission and Cadent Gas must demonstrate through credible up-to-date safety cases that risks are understood quantified realistically and managed to as low as reasonably possible (ALARP). The continued enhancement of these methodologies will further strengthen assurance in risk management.
SmartMOB
SmartMOB is a proof-of-concept project that will develop a data driven decision support model for the decarbonisation of multi-occupant buildings (MOBs) including flats apartments and mixed-use developments. MOBs present a significant decarbonisation challenge because they combine shared heating systems complex ownership structures diverse customer needs and practical constraints around reinforcement access cost allocation and disruption.
The project will explore how datasets across gas networks electricity networks local planning building data and representative customer-level data can be catalogued and connected. This will then be used to generate insight into heat demand patterns reinforcement needs appliance behaviour decarbonisation options and retrofit pathways.
The main outputs will include a catalogue of relevant data sources a data gap assessment analysis of high-rise gas energy demand stakeholder personas a prototype MOB decarbonisation model and a detailed pilot plan for a subsequent phase.
The Role of Gas Distribution Networks in Power Generation and CHP Phase 2
Phase 2 builds on Phase 1 by quantifying the long-term role system value and network interaction of gas distribution network-connected power generation. It will assess industrial and commercial combined heat and power and distribution-connected flexible generation under alternative decarbonisation pathways. The study will evaluate economic value system resilience future gas demand and interactions between gas and electricity infrastructure supporting network planning and engagement with the National Energy System Operator Ofgem and government.
Hydrogen Environment Testing of Girth Welds Phase 2 - Constant Load Testing
Previous testing carried out under NIA has outstanding gaps that require further testing to close. Completing the additional testing will confirm actual fracture toughness values to be used and the corresponding J value from the crack growth resistance curve. The project outputs are required and will be used to progress design specification and procurement processes for hydrogen major projects. The results can also be applied for repurposing assessments.
AI-Driven Policy Transformation for Hydrogen Blending in Gas Distribution Networks
Development of an AI tool to implement an AI-Driven Policy Transformation for Hydrogen Blending in Gas Distribution Networks
Biomethane Connection Optimisation
This project will set out how biomethane connections processes can be standardised across all GDNs and National Gas and evaluate why biomethane producers don’t operate at full injection capacity.
Finding the Hidden Vulnerable Stage 2
Following on from Stage 1 of the project which assessed if a predictive model could be used to find hidden vulnerability the next stage of the project is focused on identifying customers in vulnerable situations whose heat comes from Cadent delivered gas that are missing out on the protections that the Priority Service Register (PSR) brings because they are “hidden” behind a non-domestic supply contract and may not be immediately visible through existing data sets and ways of working. The project aims to proactively identify and support hidden customers in vulnerable situations within Cadent’s network by developing a data-driven model that integrates existing datasets from different sources ensuring that they receive the support that they need in the event of an interruption to supply.